Page 76 of The Last Inch Of Ice
“We didn’t execute our game plan.” “They wanted it more than we did tonight.” “We have to be better, more disciplined.”
The words taste like cardboard in his mouth.
He’s said variations of these exact sentences approximately ten times this season.
The reporters type them dutifully into their phones and laptops anyway, because they need quotes for their articles even if the quotes say absolutely nothing.
Then Rob Matthews from TSN — a reporter who’s never met a controversy he didn’t want to manufacture — leans into his microphone with the expression of a man who’s just drawn the perfect card.
“Kaisyn, your individual numbers are solid — you’re second on the team in points — but the Wardens are really struggling to find any consistency as a collective unit. Some critics, and I’m thinking specifically of the piece that ran in The Athletic yesterday, have pointed to a lack of vocal leadership in the locker room. They’ve suggested that’s something that was never a problem for your former linemate, Nazar Rykov, especially during his Cup run with Comets last year. Do you think the team is missing that kind of stabilizing presence?”
The question lands like a grenade rolled across the floor.
The comparison is provocation wrapped in the thinnest veneer of legitimate sports journalism. Rykov and the Comets aren’t even in their conference. His name has absolutely no business being in this room, in this conversation about the Wardens’ failures.
Kai should let it go. Should give a professional, deflective answer about how every team has different dynamics and you can’t compare situations directly.
He doesn’t.
A slow smile spreads across his face—the one he reserves for moments when he’s about to do something he’ll probably regret but will enjoy immensely in the moment.
“Well, you know,” he says, his voice a lazy, carrying drawl that he knows will play well on television, “it’s remarkably easy to look like a visionary leader when your entire offensive strategy is built on one beautifullysimpleprinciple.” He pauses just long enough for the reporters to lean forward. “It’s incredibly difficult to miss the net when the net is literally all you can see. Tunnel vision can be very effective. Until it isn’t.”
The room goes silent for exactly two seconds.
Then the phones come out. Someone in the back actually gasps.
The comment is just vague enough to be plausibly about general hockey philosophy — about teams that rely too heavily on shooting volume instead of strategic playmaking. But everyone in the room knows exactly who it’s about.
It’s a direct shot at Rykov’s single-minded, brutally effective style of play. An insinuation that he’s a one-dimensional player who gets results through sheer force rather than strategic brilliance.
Basically, he just implied that Rykov’s hockey IQ is close to zero.
It feels satisfyingly cruel.
Kai finishes the press conference with professional efficiency, deflects three more attempts to get him to elaborate on the Rykov comment, and leaves through the back exit before anyone can corner him for follow-up questions.
In the Uber back to his condo he pulls out his phone and sees he already has texts.
Liam:What the hell was that press conference? Dad’s going to lose his mind.
Sam:Dude. Did you just publicly trash Rykov on live television?
Vyachovsky:lol kind of true. but you know that he is still THAT good
Kai doesn’t respond to any of them. He opens Twitter instead and watches in real-time as the clip starts circulating. Within an hour, it’s everywhere — sports blogs, highlight accounts, fans making memes.
He should feel guilty. Should recognize this as the self-destructive impulse it obviously is.
Instead, he feels alive for the first time in weeks.
* * *
Two days later, the other shoe drops.
Kai is in his condo, meal-prepping for the week but actually just scrolling through social media in a masochistic exercise in doomscrolling. Fan complaints. Media hot takes about his attitude problem. Speculation about whether the Wardens will trade him at the deadline.
That’s when he sees the clip.
