Patrick Kane has tied Mike Modano, but shouldn't we talking about his chase for Brett Hull?

Some quick conversation on a night we witnessed some USA Hockey history.

Contrary to what Google’s Artificial Intelligence will tell you, Patrick Kane still has yet to surpass Mike Modano for most points in NHL history amongst American-born players.

Seriously, this is the AI overview that just popped up from Google. Please keep that in mind whenever using those AI tools — they are tools, but often flawed ones.

Anyway, in reality Kane tied Modano on Tuesday night with a secondary assist late in a 3-1 loss to the Los Angeles Kings. It was Kane’s 1,374th point and fittingly came on an eventual goal by Alex DeBrincat, one of the teammates he’s combined for more points with in his career than anyone else on the Red Wings roster.

There will be a larger celebration at point No. 1,375 and I’ll have more to write about it then.

But in the meantime, now that Modano and Kane are tied, I think it’s worth having a quick conversation about whether this is or isn’t the record we should be most worried about from a USA Hockey perspective and how we look at history.

We’ve had to use the “American-born” modifier for Modano because Brett Hull is also American. Hull may have been born in Ontario, but has been an American by international hockey standards since 1986, when he chose the United States over Canada for the World Championships that year.

Hull also played college hockey at Minnesota-Duluth, ironically both Kane and Modano went the more “Canadian route” of the WHL and OHL, and Hull led Team USA with 11 points in 1996 at the World Cup of Hockey, the last time USA Hockey ever won a best-on-best international tournament.

So while Kane is going to pass Modano sooner, the true American record, at least in my mind is the 1,391 career points Hull scored in his career, which I also assume Kane will reach, potentially this season.

It’s funny thinking about this after watching a game where Samuel Helenius scored for the Kings. Helenius, if you looked at the line chart, is a Texan and an American, he was born in Dallas.

While that’s true, Helenius was born in Dallas while his dad, Sami Helenius, was a Finnish enforcer for the Stars, he was raised in and represented Finland throughout his international career. As someone who’s written extensively about hockey in Texas, we never ever talk about Helenius as a native-born Texan like we talk about Blake Coleman or Stefan Noesen.

I guess my point here is that while we witnessed a form of USA Hockey history on Tuesday and will witness it again with Kane’s next point, perhaps there’s a bigger chase we should be highlighting and looking at. Getting to 1,375 is going to be a big deal, but getting to 1,392 should probably be even better.

Again just some food for thought, curios to hear your thoughts. Thanks for reading.