Just 24 Hours After His Gold‑Winning Goal, Jack Hughes Has Sparked a Merch Frenzy on Etsy

He might be missing teeth, but the gold-medal winning hockey player’s face seems to be worth its weight in, well, gold.

BY ALI DONALDSON, STAFF REPORTER @ALICDONALDSON

Jack Hughes. Illustration: Inc; Photo: Etsy, Getty Images

Just 24 hours after Jack Hughes shot his way into American history by clinching the gold medal-winning goal over Canada during overtime at the Milan Winter Olympics, the 25-year-old hockey player has already been immortalized by the rapid-response crafters on Etsy. 

In the past day, hundreds of items bearing his likeness—sweatshirts, t-shirts, baseball caps, stickers, keychains, canvases, flags, and posters—have dropped on the e-commerce site.

Channeling a cheeky and irrelevant sense of national pride, many of the the quick-turn products are screen-printed with the now-viral photograph of Hughes smiling through a bloody mouth of broken front teeth with the American flap draped over his shoulders and his fist raised and stamped with phrases, such as “Red, White, and Hughes,” and “Lost a Tooth. Kept the Fight.” More than a dozen designs feature the catchphrase “Blood, Sweat, and Teeth For the Gold.”

For $29.99, you can order a retro political campaign style t-shirt emblazoned with “Hughes & Hellebuyck ’26” in celebration of both Hughes’ game-winning goal and the goaltending skills of Connor Hellebuyck, who made more than 40 saves during the game.

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Five people already did, according to Etsy.

Other items feature the slogan “Band of Brothers,” in a nod to the older Hughes brother Quinn, who is also on the U.S. men’s hockey team and scored his own game-winning goal during overtime in the quarterfinals. There’s even a $34.99 hat stitched with the quote, “I love the USA. I’m proud to be an American,” which Hughes said in a now-viral interview with Olympics broadcaster NBC after the game. 

As the internet shows, when you break a 46-year gold medal drought, people want something to remember the moment with. They want the merch. 

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