Folks will be asking Jack Hughes to smile in photos a lot less now.
The Team USA hero, whose cracked teeth are now part of Olympic lore after scoring the golden goal in the 2026 Games, revealed that he will have his grill fixed soon — even if some disapprove.
“Yeah, the amount of dentists that have reached out, man, it’s too many,” Hughes told the Daily Mail. “But I’m going to get them fixed, hopefully this week.”
He added: “I think people will be pissed if I do get them fixed.”
Team USA ending its 46-year gold-medal drought in the Olympic Games will forever be remembered for Hughes scoring in overtime to down Canada and the lasting photos featuring his cracked feeth.
Hughes, 24, entered the game with a full set of teeth, but he lost part of them after taking a stick to the mouth from Canada’s Sam Bennett in the third period.
They say hockey players are built differently when it comes to toughness and a bloodied Hughes did not let that blow keep him from providing one of USA’s grandest hockey moments.
The Devils star scored 1:41 into overtime to win the gold.
One of the iconic scenes from the postgame celebration featured a smiling Hughes, with blood in his mouth, draped with an American flag over his shoulders and showering in love from the fans
“I just remember (brother) Quinn, he was the first guy closest to me, and I remember him coming up to me at the TV timeout and he’s like, ‘It’s not that bad, it’s only chipped,’” Hughes said with a laugh while making an appearance with Quinn on “The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon” last week.
His teeth have since become a national talking point and even a gag for fans, with Fallon joking that the cracked teeth may become Hughes’ “thing.”
Hughes said that fans have come up to him and specifically asked him to smile for photos in order to be captured alongside the cracked teeth.
The star NHLer chalked up the delay in surgery to not wanting to be in the dentist office, although NHL play resumed shortly after he and his fellow Team USA stars returned from Milan.
“I can promise you this wont be my thing,” Hughes told Fallon.
While fans may love the cracked teeth, the opinion of pop star Tate McRae may be the one that carries the most weight since the pair are now “exclusively dating,” according to US Weekly.
