NHL 23 puts two of hockey’s brightest stars on the cover

polygon.com:

With Electronic Arts’ hockey franchise now in its fourth decade of existence, NHL 23 will deliver two milestones for the series: Its cover features Trevor Zegras of the Anaheim Ducks and Sarah Nurse of the Canadian women’s national team, marking the first time in EA Sports NHL history that a woman has appeared on the cover of a game, and the first time that two people have shared the stage.

For years now, EA has been putting some of the NHL’s youngest stars on the box, like Auston Matthews (twice), P.K. Subban, and Connor McDavid. Zegras, 21, is even earlier in his career than those players were when they became EA Sports NHL cover athletes. But he’s already starting to put together an impressive resume, having finished second in the voting for the Calder Trophy (the NHL’s rookie of the year award) with 61 points — 23 goals and 38 assists — in 75 games last season.

As for Nurse, 27, she made a name for herself on the world’s biggest hockey stage at the Winter Olympics in Beijing earlier this year. Setting Olympic records for most points (18) and most assists (13) in a single women’s hockey tournament, Nurse helped Team Canada capture a gold medal and avenge the squad’s shootout loss to the Americans four years earlier. Nurse, who is biracial, also became the first Black woman to win an Olympic gold medal in hockey.

A post shared by Sarah Nurse (@nursey16)

With the NHL always searching for young, marketable stars, and professional women’s hockey leagues working to gain a foothold, Zegras and Nurse are sensible choices for NHL 23’s cover. In their own way, each of them represents a modern type of athlete who is changing the face of hockey.

The buttoned-up, team-first hockey culture of old is slowly giving way to times