Nico Hischier: Driven to Succeed | BIG READ 

As Nico Hischier sat down for this interview, I interjected quickly, ‘I just wanted to talk to you about how you feel about Game 500.’

He sat down slowly, put his hand on his back and said facetiously: ‘Oh, my back, I’m getting old.’

It was all in good fun, because even at game No. 500, which will take place Saturday against Philadelphia, Hischier is still a young man at 26 years old.

It is inherently difficult to get Hischier to talk about himself; he’s not wired that way. Everything is about the team, about others, and how he can support them. So, opening up about hitting a milestone of 500 games in the NHL was going to take a slow build.

It was a little easier to open up the discussion about his good friend and teammate Jesper Bratt, who just recently reached 500 games. They’ve been together since the start of the 2017-18 season and have been through it all together. As the only two remaining players from their rookie seasons, they share a profound bond and have a shared, lived experience of how far this team has come.

It's unique only to themselves.

“What makes it unique?" Hischier asked rhetorically. "It's the understanding what we've been through with this organization, also the bonding of getting in here as kids and how much we have developed ourselves personally, off the ice. Just going through this with him; he's the guy who I've been around more than my family the past eight years."

They've grown up together in every facet: from young, unassuming boys to grown men, from young rookies to youthful veterans.

"You're there every step," Hischier said. "If someone is not feeling well, you know this, if he's feeling bad, you know this, everything that comes through life, through the hockey together, he's always there."

And he will be there on Saturday when Hischier hits a new milestone. Bratt hit the 500 milestone on Dec. 6, 2024; now it is Hischier's turn.

"Somehow, it goes fast, but somehow, I can look back and say I've been here for a while," the Devils captain said. "I just turned 26, there are some really good years ahead. Just thinking back on the team we had when I first got here, the first year to now, it's so different. It's been different for a couple of years now."

"I have never, never (taken) a day for granted."

A little more comfortable now, the brain shifting through a Rolodex of memories, Hischier spoke about himself with a little more ease.

What would he tell his younger self about where he's going to be, where the team is, and what experiences he will have had as he approached 500 NHL games eight years into his career?

"I wouldn't tell myself much," he said earnestly. "I wouldn't try to change too much, to be honest. I think back then, I just remember my first year, you're not worrying about too much. You're happy to be there, you're happy to play in the National Hockey League. You're traveling. You see all the cities and arenas. It's just like, every day, something new. It's exciting.

"I have never, never (taken) a day for granted. There are a lot of people that want to play in the NHL. A hard day or a couple of tough games, you have to have the right mindset and be thankful to just be in here."

And then he paused, seemingly realizing there was one thing he would say as reassurance to his younger self.

"Go ahead, learn new lessons, learn about hockey and how life works," he said, gathering his thoughts.

"No bad days here, no bad days when you're in the NHL."

Hischier was a wide-eyed, quiet, unassuming 18-year-old when he first walked into the Devils locker room as that year’s 1^st-overall selection at the 2017 NHL Draft. Forced immediately into the limelight, he handled the bright lights with brilliance for someone who seeks little attention.

Andy Greene, the Devils captain at the time, remembers it well.

"He comes in as the first-overall pick, but he was very humble, very eager to be here to learn, and just be a big part of this team," Greene recalled. "He always had a smile on his face. He was always there and working, just very personable."

The club has come a long way since Hischier's first day, and much of that has to do with Hischier himself. He is the cornerstone, the backbone of the resurgence of the New Jersey Devils: the first foundational piece on which this next generation sits. Five hundred games in, and he assuredly says he hasn't taken a moment for granted.

It's a mentality that he also quickly learned to embrace from Greene.

"He was a guy that always said, 'No bad days here, no bad days when you're in the NHL,'" Hischier said.

Greene, who was there for Hischier's first day and is still around the club now as an advisor to Hockey Operations, has also watched Hischier's evolution—from a young kid to taking over the captaincy and contributing every single night in ways only Nico can. He's watched Hischier grow into his role as a hockey player and a leader, but some things, even all these years and 500 games later, have stayed the same, he says.

"Yeah, he's changed, but he has not," Greene said. "He's stayed the same, true to who he is on and off the ice. And I just think it's only going to keep getting better."

"We knew he was special."

And as Nico gets better, so does the team around him. He is very much the heartbeat of the team he leads, and even looking back to game No. 1, Greene could see it.

"You could tell right from Game 1, we knew he was special," the former captain said. "He was a good leader and he was going to be a captain.”

"I don't take that for granted, having the 'C'", Hischier said. "It's a big responsibility, and in a weird way, sometimes I take that too serious. It can be almost like everything comes down on me, but that's why I love being on a hockey team, too. Yeah, I'm a leader, I have to make sure things are (done a certain way), but at the end of the day we need everyone on board. And that's my job, to make sure everybody feels welcome, that everybody feels part of the team. You win together, you lose together. That's the beauty of it."

"You shouldn't be afraid to say we want to contend for a Cup."

Hischier has never been one to look backward. So, it becomes intuitive to steer his answers about looking back on his first 500 games into what lies ahead of him. He carries heavy expectations of himself and the team. He always has his eyes on the future.

"You shouldn't be afraid to say we want to contend for a Cup," he said with conviction. "I've been on a few different teams here and I think we have a really good crew now, together, from goaltending to D to up front. We have it all. But there's obviously really good teams out there, too. In the National Hockey League, there are no bad teams. Even the teams that are in the back of the standings, they can sometimes win. So that's why we set the bar high ... you've got to have high expectations."

"For us, every game, it doesn't matter, every detail has to be dialed in the way you want to play and if you do that, that's when we play our best hockey and that's how you win in the end," he continued. "Delivering that, that's a hard thing."

But Hischier has never been one to shy away from the hard work or back down from doing the hard thing. It has pushed him to elite status in his first 500 NHL games. He's driven to succeed, and that, along with good health, is what he hopes for as he enters the next 500 games.

"Health," he says, of his personal hope going forward. "And it would be obviously nice to have maybe a couple of rings."

He paused, smiled and said: "But we'll start with one!"