hpandcarbs

1. Shane 'i don't care if it's not about Hockey' Hollander respected him enough as a team mate that he was like, okay maybe I can talk to him outside of work and became his best friend. Shane must talk to him about Hockey all the time and Hayden is part of those conversations AND probably works even harder because of being close to Shane

2. Ilya is an asshole but he wouldn't chirp about something that would be an actual insecurity to people he likes or respects (or Shane loves) like??? Hunter ISN'T that old, but he's older than Ilya so he's decrepit and dying. Hayden isn't a bad player he's just not as good as Shane and Ilya (no one is) so he is 15th best Montreal player. Ilya is perceptive and fundamentally kind despite him being an asshole who would punch your teeth out. he wouldn't joke with Hayden's KIDS and WIFE about him being shit at his job unless they all knew it was a joke???

3. Hayden is as good as Troy IMO. We see how frustrated Ilya gets with a linemate who can't keep up with him until he gets Troy. Shane is the BEST HOCKEY PLAYER like breached containment level good but Hockey is still a TEAM SPORT. If Shane is leading in points and goals then a massive proportion of those points are being passed either to or from Hayden!! he's on Shane's line!! for 10 years!!! he's a good enough Hockey player to be on Shane Hollanders line!!! for 3 Stanley cups!!

what they didn’t expect, however, was shane inventing new levels of downbadisms and basically defends his husband and/or justifying his actions every time. he basically “yeah but” his way to ilya being a perfect angel who can do no wrong

i think holmberg starts them off with good luck babe since it's her big breakthrough hit and ilya is like "hm. so this is a song about being in a relationship with someone who's in denial about being gay? and they won't admit to the relationship because of it? interesting" while staring directly at shane who is making very determined eye contact with the floor.

and holmberg (clueless) is like "yeah she writes a lot of situationship anthems actually!" and puts on casual.

which allows shane to pull an instant uno reverse card and stare daggers into the side of ilya's head while going "wow, imagine what it would be like to spend years sleeping with someone who sends really confusing mixed signals by saying that what you have is casual but then treating you like it's not casual at all. that would suck."

In all seriousness, though, OP is right. They play the same position: centre. Which means Ilya will be the first line centre in Ottawa and Shane the second line centre. And no, it’s not a demotion for Shane. If you have arguably the two best centres in the league on different lines, the opposing defencemen and goalies can NEVER rest. The offensive threat is relentless.

On most hockey teams, the strongest offensive players are on the first line. Which means when the second line’s shift starts, these players aren’t as good. But when the second line centre is Shane motherfucking Hollander, you don’t get a rest. You never get a chance to catch your breath.

Particularly when your first line centre and second line centre are competitive with each other. You just know they’ll be pushing the wingers on their respective lines relentlessly because each of them wants to outdo his husband’s line. For bragging rights or better sex or whatever.

Every team in the league will hate playing against Ottawa, and be bitter at Montreal for fumbling Shane. Because they effectively have two first offensive lines, and that’s very difficult to play against.

when he was crashing out about trading to ottawa, he said, "You know, it's just gonna be really hard to leave melissa," and hayden was sitting right there like. "melissa?? it's gonna be hard to leave MELISSA??"

only to get to the 12+ age range where ilya is still SO young and still has baby fat on his cheeks but shane knows from the timeline atp that he's lost his mom and is SO alone in that house and it's going to be SO many years until he's out of it and they can find each other and even longer until they can actually be honest with each other, but painfully young ilya in this photo doesn't KNOW THAT! he thinks he's ALL ALONE!! he doesn't know shane is WAITING FOR HIM!!

and not helping this is that this just happened to be one of the rare nights where he had something to drink when rose was over earlier, so he's a little wine tipsy going into this which did NOT set him up for emotional success