Tom Wilson showed the entire NHL world in his hometown how much he grew up. Among a mix of boos and cheers from the fans who mostly pack the building for their hometown Maple Leafs. For those who booed, they were bitter about their favorite player getting injrured early in Wilson's career as a result of his encorcer type style play.
The ones who gave him the hometown hero welcome knew he had to change his style of play to at least garner more respect across the league. And the players at Team Nathan MacKinnon knew this very well. Among that team, Tate McRae was the one with the annoucment due to his "grit" style of play.
Team MacKinnon took down Team McDavid 4-3 in the shootout. Wilson skated for 5:59 there. Wilson had two shots and shot it at 5:59. But Team MacKinnon got eliminated. The All Star Game hosts for Tema Matthews led by the Maple Leafs own Auston Matthews.
Tom Wilson alos shined the day before at the All Star Skills Challenge and he didn't even participate. He enjoyed watching his NHL peers compete as Connor McDavid took home the $1 million prize money. Although Wilson sipped a beer, when he got interveiwed by ESPN's Emily Kaplan he put it out of the camera shot.
Tom Wilson's dad Peter Wilson was also nostalgic about his hometown Toronto when he talked to Bailey Johnson of The Washington Post($):
"Being in Toronto, being in a different market and then going to Washington and just seeing how he's received and how much he loves and cares about the community and how much it all means to him, it's very fun and surreal as an older brother. You're sort of like on the inside, but also you get the objective perspective of how good he is with people. ..."Peter Wilson (Tom Wilson's dad) via WaPo
Next up is a home game Tuesday night against the Montreal Canaidens at 7 p.m. from Capital One Arena.