{"id":537987,"date":"2026-03-22T04:53:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T04:53:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/537987\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T04:53:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T04:53:13","slug":"cole-hutson-on-his-newfound-fortnite-battles-with-ryan-leonard-hes-the-bait-guy-and-i-kill-everyone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/537987\/","title":{"rendered":"Cole Hutson on his newfound Fortnite battles with Ryan Leonard: \u2018He\u2019s the bait guy, and I kill everyone\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

ARLINGTON, VA \u2014 For Cole Hutson<\/a>, signing his NHL contract meant getting to know a lot of new faces. His college schedule prevented him from attending training camps since the Capitals drafted him in 2024, and though the team checked in on him regularly, he didn\u2019t meet most of his teammates until arriving in DC.<\/p>\n

Ryan Leonard<\/a>, however, Hutson knew well. Hutson and Leonard played together at the US National Team Development Program as teenagers, then became rivals at Boston University and Boston College, and now get to be teammates once again in DC. The pair kept in close contact even when playing for different leagues.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would text Leno pretty much every day,\u201d Hutson told RMNB. \u201cWe\u2019re pretty close off the ice. So we\u2019d always reach out to one another, just talking about life and whatnot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leonard was the first to reach out to Hutson after he signed \u2014 telling reporters he\u2019d texted even before the move was official \u2014 and the pair caught up during Hutson\u2019s first afternoon in DC. In the days since, the pair have taken to playing Fortnite together in their time off the ice.<\/p>\n

\u201c(We\u2019ve been playing the) past five days,\u201d Hutson said. \u201cPlaying quite a bit\u2026 We\u2019ve been playing builds lately. We started off no builds, and then we were like, all right, let\u2019s move into builds. We\u2019re getting better.\u201d<\/p>\n

To hear Hutson tell it, he\u2019s the better Fortnite player of the two, though they\u2019ve also teamed up for the game\u2019s Duos mode.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Leonard\u2019s) not too bad,\u201d Hutson acknowledged. \u201cBut we do some where he\u2019s the bait guy, and I kill everyone, so it\u2019s fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

Getting to play for the Capitals together has proven a boon for both Hutson and Leonard. Having Leonard available as a familiar face is an obvious benefit for Hutson as he navigates the newness of the NHL, but even for Leonard, now nearly a year into his NHL career, Hutson\u2019s presence has only made him more secure.<\/p>\n

\u201cKnowing each other going into this definitely helps him and helps the transition that he has to make,\u201d Leonard said earlier this week. \u201cIt\u2019s also comfortable for me too, right? Knowing him already and putting another familiar face already on this tight-knit team helps a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rest of the Capitals, too, have welcomed Hutson in with open arms, even before he put ink to paper. The team touched base with Hutson on a regular basis during his season at BU, and having an NHL team so invested in his wellbeing only bolstered his confidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomeone from the team or coaching staff would reach out probably every few days, and that was awesome,\u201d he said. \u201cIt was a good feeling, knowing I was wanted here all last year, which was awesome\u2026(They were) mostly just checking in and seeing how I\u2019m doing.\u201d<\/p>\n

That support was especially appreciated when Hutson sustained a frightening injury<\/a> at World Juniors in December, taking a puck to the back of his head before leaving the ice on a stretcher. Even without having met him, many the Capitals offered their well-wishes to their future teammate.<\/p>\n

\u201cA lot of the guys reached out after my injury at World Juniors, so that was unbelievable,\u201d Hutson recalled. \u201cIt just shows the kind of locker room that we have here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pierre-Luc Dubois<\/a> later invited Hutson to move in after he signed his NHL deal, much as he did for Ryan Leonard in his early days with the Capitals.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s awesome,\u201d Hutson said. \u201cHis wife\u2019s amazing. Yeah, it\u2019s starting a good bond. He\u2019s got two dogs there right now. It\u2019s a blast living there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hutson has even spent some time gaming together with Dubois, though there\u2019s no word yet on whether he\u2019s joined Hutson and Leonard in their Fortnite pursuits.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe played a little bit of Xbox. We did, like, the Olympics on PS5 where we played golf, baseball..that was a blast.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ARLINGTON, VA \u2014 For Cole Hutson, signing his NHL contract meant getting to know a lot of new…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":537988,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,99],"class_list":["post-537987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/537987","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=537987"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/537987\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/537988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=537987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=537987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=537987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}