It’s a bit of an NHL tradition for players to place their newborn baby in the top of the Stanley Cup to celebrate winning the sport’s biggest prize.
It’s something Mike Matheson admits he’s been thinking about.
“A few times, yeah.”
That’s what the Montreal Canadiens defenceman told Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman just days after he and his wife Emily welcomed their third child – a parenting milestone that’s come amid Montreal’s Stanley Cup run.
Miles was born the day after the Habs defeated the Buffalo Sabres in Game 7 of the second round of the playoffs. The timing of that, it turns out, was not entirely coincidental.
“It was a crazy whirlwind after Game 7 in Buffalo to fly right back and get to the hospital at seven in the morning the next morning,” Matheson said.
“I was a little nervous leading up to it, because I didn’t want to put pressure on Emily either with induction and stuff like that. So I was kind of just leaving it alone. She was the one who brought it up. She was like, ‘OK, what game are we going to do it so you don’t have to miss anything?’ Obviously, it worked out that we ended up going to Game 7 and winning so that we could do it the next day.”
Matheson, who has two goals and two assists in 17 games these playoffs, says balancing hockey and being a dad of three is not always easy.
“I’m so committed to being the best hockey player I could possibly be, and I’m committed to that every single day of the year,” he told Friedman. “But at the same time, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I’ve played my best hockey ever since I became a parent. I feel like beforehand it would consume me, it’s all I could think about. A bad game, I couldn’t let it go and stuff like that.
“Now, I leave the rink, I have responsibilities to be the best version of myself for my kids and my wife. I feel like that’s helped me a lot.”
The Canadiens are down 2-1 to the Carolina Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference final, with Game 4 happening Wednesday at 8 p.m. ET on Sportsnet.
