MILAN — Brock Nelson didn’t call his grandfather while he was in Italy with Team USA.
The time change, plus Bill Christian’s age, made texting the easier option.
And over the years, Brock has come to expect those messages before games anyway.
“It’s going to be emotional when I call my grandpa,” Nelson said Sunday, soon after following in his footsteps by winning Olympic gold in the 2-1 U.S. overtime win against Canada. “I’m sure I’ve got a message from him already. To soak that in, it means a lot.”
As has been well chronicled, Nelson is the third generation of his family to represent Team USA in men’s hockey at the Olympics.
His great-uncle Gordon played in 1956 in Cortina; Bill Christian and Brock’s great-uncle Roger Christian won gold in Squaw Valley in 1960; and Brock’s uncle Dave Christian was part of the Miracle on Ice in 1980.
For so long, it looked all but impossible that Brock would join them.
The NHL skipped the Olympics in 2018 and 2022, and truth be told, Nelson likely wouldn’t have been in the conversation for those teams even if they had gone.
His career bloomed late: 2021-22 was his first 30-goal season with the Islanders.
Since then, hitting the number has become practically an annual occurrence, and he’s already on 29 with the Avalanche this year through 55 games.
Making the 4 Nations Face-Off a year ago came down to the wire.
But this year, given what Nelson showed he could do as a two-way player with Team USA, there was never much question about it.
“He had a family member in ’60, a family member on ’80,” Charlie McAvoy said. “We weren’t gonna win this without [the] Nelson family tree.”
Nelson ended up with a huge role to play in this tournament, helping key a penalty kill that went a perfect 18-for-18 while contributing two goals and an assist across six games.
Even better, he did it with his uncle in attendance.
“I just [told him] we did it,” Nelson said. “Crazy. What is it, 46 years to the day?”
Indeed, the Miracle on Ice was 46 years ago, exactly on Sunday, and 66 years from when Team USA opened its 1960 Olympics with a win over Sweden.
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Nelson has said over the years that he never quite understood the magnitude of his uncle’s achievements until watching “Miracle.”
This, you can safely assume, he had an immediate grasp on.
“You think about it, when you’re watching as a kid, I’m sure this is going to be a moment that younger kids are talking about,” Nelson said. “To see Jack [Hughes] score that OT winner and they’ll try to recreate, to envision themselves in that spot. Hopefully [it] keeps the sport [moving] the way it’s been going the last 10, 20 years.”
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