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You bet your ass I'm gonna webweave this into wsh retaliating for leno's sake because

i have made attempts to sort these various pull quotes into rough categories for organization's sake. there's a lot of content here but i do think it's worth reading in our efforts to figure out what makes leno tick.

leno's role on the bc line:

bc line scouting report (x):

more bc line scouting (x):

even more bc line scouting (x):

more from that same scouting report:

in summary: not the brightest of the bunch, but the most physical, the hardest worker, and the most defensively responsible. basically, he was their dog. also, every time someone calls leno "not cerebral" an angel gets its wings.

the will/leno dynamic:

will on leno (x):

more will on leno (x):

on the theme of will leaving and leno staying (x):

and while i have a whole post detailing their bc commitments, i only JUST found this article with this little tidbit (x):

(i think i could now add an addendum to that post about will's assumptions of leno's hero worship for his brother and how it actually played out, and leno's version of getting gabe to commit vs. will's. this lore is FASCINATING!)

the family dynamic:

on leno's competitiveness (x):

more from leno on the family competitiveness (x):

this quote is in my brother issues post but it bears repeating here (x):

on leno's compete and his western mass origins (x):

it's just important to remember that there is a 6 year age difference between leno and his brother, and his sisters are even older. so the dynamic where little leno was apparently FIST FIGHTING his big brother when he was little, so competitive he hated losing to his older siblings, and didn't get close with john until he was at least in his early teens... oh leno. you have always been the baby who is clawing for his place in the world, huh?

scouting reports that are also character analysis:

more on compete level (x):

also from that same article this list is ‼️‼️‼️

more on his compete (x):

more compete quotes (x):

on his strength/physicality (x):

more quotes from his ntdp coach (x):

more scouting report (x):

(another angel gained its wings 🪽)

coach muse at it again (x):

from that same article:

he's got that dog in him! and gabe and will used to hold his leash!! anyway there is an important theme here. yes i cherry picked these quotes from his scouting reports but his hands and his edges don't speak to his CHARACTERIZATION okay!

let's start with a brief introduction, and who else to introduce our man than will smith hockey himself?

(video source if you'd like to see the stupid fond smile will can't keep off his dumb face while zeev gives a perfectly normal response)

okay, then few quick zeev facts to set the stage:

born 12/7/05 in San Diego, CA

parents were Israeli immigrants who "didn't know a lick of English" and came to the U.S. with "anywhere from $3,000-$5,000 and one suitcase with both their clothes in it." real coming from nothing origin story! (source - those quotes are zeev's)

youngest of three brothers; older brother shai also played for denver and was drafted 36th overall by detroit

zeev played at shattuck (19-20, 20-21), ntdp (21-22, 22-32), and university of denver (23-24, 24-25)

he was a late bloomer! was only 5'2", 120lbs when he went to shattuck at 13, and grew 5-6 during covid lockdown (source), ultimately reaching 6" by the nhl combine

you know who else has been impressed with his growth?

(source + bonus leno quote - context here is denver's matchup against BU and BC in the 2024 ncaa finals)

zeev also has this incredibly cool tattoo (which is going to be really important later i promise):

(that's his 2024 world juniors gold. dunno if he's gonna have to squeeze a 2025 date on his arm now too!)

that's all i've got for my zeev-specific posting, but he seems like a generally charming and confident bordering on cocky guy. so let's get into the narratives!!

since zeev and mack's paths crossed first, we'll start there and get into that horny quote from mack above. how does mack know that zeev was taller bigger smoother faster when they faced each other in college? they played together at shattuck for a year (20-21)! i'm not clear on how close exactly they were at shattuck, given it was a weird covid bubble year and mack was on the 14U AAA team while zeev was on the 15U AAA team, however, we've got quite a number of quotes from both of them to suggest some sort of bond took place. let's dive in!!

(tweet source) old friends but don't let zeev catch mack complimenting him okay (there will be an emerging pattern here lol)

remember mack's hilarious reaction to not hitting 6 feet at the combine? take a stroll down memory lane and revisit it in this draft interview mack gives. or if you don't want to click through the link, here's the most important mack answer gives when he's asked about his experience at the combine/not cheating by going up on his toes to get an extra fourth of an inch: “Me and Zeev measured ourselves before and I thought we’d both hit six foot but I guess not.”

what do you mean, you and zeev were measuring yourselves?? would that be before or after you guys hung out in cole eiserman's room every night, watching movies and wrestling a little bit, as cole dutifully reported in his draft diary?

sure, yeah. just a little bit of wrestling amongst boys.

anyway, you know who found mack missing 6 feet really funny?

(tweet source) "a bit" yeah i bet

clearly they are constantly giving it to each other, but probably the most iconic zeev/mack moment is this one:

here's a transcript if you cannot spare 12 seconds to click and watch the video, but i promise it's worth 12 seconds of your life:

[boys all enter press room with a podium; someone says, "get up there mack!"] mack: "yeah, i'll answer a question." [sits at podium] [audience shot of zeev raising his hand. off screen, a voice says, "yeah, second row on the right."] zeev: [using a water bottle as a mic] "how does it feel to never win anything?" mack: "aahhuhh, next question."

zeev cockily refusing to let mack win at anything seems to be the bedrock of their relationship; if you scroll down to the second video embedded in this article, zeev and mack and a couple of other guys greet each other at the draft and this exchange happens:

zeev: "you look good. i look better." mack: "no, you don't!" zeev: "i win again."

sick of this theme yet? no? okay, well, remember how i promised that tattoo would be important? here you go:

if you don't want to watch the video: a reporter asks mack about zeev's "what's it like to never win anything" question and mack has to explain: “Well, U18s, World Juniors, and the national championship…[Zeev] got a tattoo of all his championships and at the combine, we were joking around saying that’s my losing record.” yep, mack lost to zeev in all of those. oh it's rich. RICH! zeev's tattoo he has inked on his skin FOREVER is mack's losing record. what a funny JOKE for mack!! i'm sure it doesn't keep him up at night, how he's never once bested zeev when it counted.

but okay. they can in fact get along! just look at how nicely they work together here to blind rank nhl players when mack defers to zeev:

and finally, to wrap up our mack/zeev section, this video of them fussing with each other's ties and zeev "pretending" to kiss mack's cheek to make him laugh. you know. just buddy stuff :)

okay, moving onto will smith! after zeev left shattuck, he went on to the ntdp where he played with will for two years. much like mack, most of the will/zeev content is from stuff that happened post playing together, but i suffered through parts of a SC podcast to bring you these will quotes on zeev:

(on the 2024 wjc team): “we had a team clown and that was zeev buium.”

“off the ice he’s one of my best friends. we were roommates at ntdp on the road.”

📝📝📝 team clown, road roommates... but do we think they wrestled a little in their hotel room?

the most important will/zeev lore, though, is this incredible will quote from the empty netters pod:

“I actually have a funny thing about lobster that just came to my mind about the program. So some days we’d be pretty bored, so my buddy and I, Zeev Buium, there’s a Red Lobster just in the middle of Plymouth, Michigan that looks like no one has ever eaten at. So we’d go in there and we’d all pick out our own lobsters living there to go back and get it [hand gesture like he’s pointing at a lobster in a tank??] and then we’d have a game who could stay the longest in the Red Lobster. So we’d stay in Red Lobster for four hours. […] That was our degree of boredom.”

talk about an origin story!! they so bored they went to a red lobster that looked like no one has ever eaten at for four hours. and they were both boys. (god i bet those red lobster staff hated them lmao)

okay, the rest of these are all from the same bauer event (i think?) where will and zeev look generally flirtatious/handsy with one another, but they are important pics/videos to document their vibe.

first, pic of zeev on will's lap - that stupid polaroid blocks the video where zeev reaches for will's thumb on the knob of his stick (criminal) but the horny intent is there:

also does will have to make sure his fingers are brushing zeev's bare neck/collar like that? obviously.

a more "serious" pic of that moment that only manages to turn the horniness down a couple of degrees:

will & zeev & puppies:

will look at zeev like a normal person challenge: failed

and of course, we can't forget the most infamous zeev/will pic:

while the mack/zeev vibe is pulling pigtails, trying to one-up each other, constant (good natured?) competition, the will/zeev vibe seems to be missing that competitive edge. they just wanna flirt and touch each other.

finally, an extremely intriguing pic will posted for zeev's bday in december 2024. when was zeev in boston, because i assume that's where this BC table lives? of all the many pics will must have of zeev, he chose this one where zeev's clearly in his territory? this wouldn't happen to have anything to do with mack and all the flirting he and zeev did at the draft, would it? no, that would be silly!

both canada and the usa breezed through the group stages and the quarter finals - everything was looking up! that's why it was such a shock when denmark scored TWO goals in the LAST TWO minutes of canada's semi final to win 2-1!

conversely, team usa breezed past finland, beating them 5-2, and then all of a sudden there were no chances of will and mack facing each other at worlds!

after this shock loss, i think many of us didn't expect mack to surface anywhere soon, but team canada played their semifinal in denmark and apparently were so convinced that they would be making the final, that they left most of the players' luggage in stockholm! 😶

what this did mean is that will and mack were finally in the same location for the first time after the entirety of worlds, as the final was being held in stockholm. many of us certainly joked that they would meet up. in fact, when warsofsky (sharks and usa head coach at the time) mentioned running into mack in a coffee shop - i headcanoned that of course will was there too, only to later find out that... oh yep, he ACTUALLY WAS.

"After they lost to Denmark, I ran into Mack at a coffeeshop in Stockholm. Him and Will were hanging out. We gotta pick him back up a little bit."

sorry, yes. will was literally prepping for a gold medal game yet still made time to grab a coffee with mack before he left, probably knowing how much mack was beating himself up about it🥹 the gold medal game was also obviously against denmark, so will was able to get some revenge for him when team usa WON!!! it was their first tournament win in 92 years and will got to be a part of it :')

lots of will's family were in attendance (he's waving to them here) and, of course, will vote was there.

-> Small (seperate) updates post-Worlds 😴

worlds wrapped up on may 25th, and not a lot happened for a while as both will and mack took a well-deserved break :) some memorable events include...

toff travelling up to vancouver around mack's birthday (or for it??). together they do the grouse grind (running up a mountain), where mack demolishes a struggling toff. then toff joins the celebrinis for family dinner!

will renting an apartment in boston with matty beniers where they watched some fireworks together??

San Jose Sharks forward Will Smith and Seattle Kraken forward Matty Beniers have built a terrific friendship. The duo lived together over the summer. “He was a good roommate. He kept his stuff clean. I appreciated that. We golfed a lot,”

will attending a coldplay concert with his friends that turned out to be THE coldplay concert where a couple were caught having an affair.

so anyway, yeah. content was slow as you would expect in the offseason. then it gets to the end of july and... BAM!

-> Will and Mack appear in Halifax together! 🥅

will and mack were pictured with fans in halifax around the 30th july! as we can see, they're in rogers square which is a space with shopping and restuarants. out grabbing dinner together maybe?? maybe will located somewhere on titkok? 👀

also a fun note, mack is pictured in his 'celly apparel' hoodie, which he litterally never seems to take off during this off season lol. it's likely a gift from alexander wennberg!

as nathan mackinnon was getting married around this time... the joke was of course that mack had gotten invited to the wedding after worlds and will was his plus one😁 ... as it turns out, mack had gotten invited by sid to join him for some training over the summer!

mack was seen golfing with sid and nate prior to the camp :) both sid and nate had heaps of praise for mack post worlds.

-> Will and Mack attend Sidney Crosby's Cwench Camp 🏒

some of you may be sitting here wondering, what the hell is 'cwench camp'??? basically...

"Cwench" camp refers to the CWENCH Elite Training Camp—an elite, invitation-only summer hockey development camp. Crosby frequently attends, trains, and skates at this event alongside other top-tier NHL stars and elite prospects. The camp, often hosted at locations like Saint Mary's University, is closely associated with CWENCH Hydration, a sports drink brand that Crosby officially partnered with. At the camp, Crosby trains with peers like Nathan MacKinnon, Connor McDavid, and Brad Marchand, while also helping mentor elite young players participating in CWENCH's development divisions.

as it's held in nova scotia, unsurprisingly, a lot of the big team canada players end up being invited. after mack spent a lot of time with guys who attend regularly at worlds, it really wasn't a surprise that mack was invited... but it was that will was!

of course we will never get an explicit reason why, but one has to wonder whether mack asked if will could attend (it is closer for them to train together there, rather than will flying all the way to vancouver after all), or maybe the PR person at cwench knows what a huge draw these two are together! who knows! but will was definitely there.

on spittin' chiclets, when asked if he was nervous about it, will says:

"I was with Kevin Hayes a couple of days before and obviously [Hayes and Sid] play together, so he was texting him that I was coming, so that made it a little bit better."

so it sounds like sid didn't personally extend an invite or anything like he may have done for mack. will may've gotten an invite through kevin hayes (who he's 'pretty good friends' with and neighbours with in the summer), but the way will says it kind of makes him sound like he was a last minute addition to the camp??? hmm idk.

will and mack can be seen in this video from the camp, wearing their teal sharks helmet, pants and bauer/ccm gloves as the only two sj sharks in attendence :) in-action video here, too!

also pretty sure that mack is filming some kind of content for cwench in this pic from above that i only just realised never saw the light of day?! it's the same place natemac filmed content for this post... we were robbed. (probably something to do with his other brand deals, i assume? unless we see it this off season!)

edit: it’s this video! :)

here's what mack had to say about it!

“It was great,” he said, adding that Sharks teammate Will Smith and Columbus Blue Jackets forward Adam Fantilli also took part. “Just skating. They were great skates.”

will said 'it was obviously pretty cool!' sid was 'impressed by what he saw from the teenager.'

-> Will and Mack hang out in Halifax 🥰

will and mack take pics with some fans along the boardwalk by the waterfront! according to a lovely halifax local anon, there are tons of cute little food stalls and activities near there! (prime wsh real estate if you ask me) also, will looks built as hell!!!

will and mack are also hanging out with wyatt johnston of the dallas stars and adam fantilli of the columbus blue jackets! :) mack actually knows fantilli very well. he helped mack with his decision to join the chicago steel, as fantilli played there the previous couple of seasons!

they were teammates for canada's junior and senior international squads, regularly training together and occasionally sharing lines during worlds 2025! here they are hugging each other during a brawl when the sharks played the blue jackets lol.

neither will or mack have obvious connections with wyatt that i could find, so hopefully they managed to make some new younger nhler friends outside of their little codependent bubble :)

it's around this time that this photo of will and gabe is posted where it looks like his st. christophers coin may have been missing from his chain? we know now that it's still very much there (evolution of will's chain here) and is just hiding in his shirt here, but this also sparked what was deemed 'chaingate' (aka - headcanon that will gave mack his st christophers coin when they were in halifax🥰)

-> Mack goes to Team Canada Olympic Orientation Camp, Will trains at BU 🐶

mack is invited to the prospective pool of players for the milano-cortina winter olympics 2026 and halfs his anxieties by making sure he sticks to connor bedard's side after golfing with him in vancouver.

meanwhile, will goes back home to boston where he attends a training camp at his old rival school... BU!

this later caused much confusion for cole hutson and cole eiserman (mack's former teammates at bu) when they were giving a tour on youtube and they found one of will's sticks he must have left behind...

and that's pretty much a wrap for the 24/25 off-season! but wait, the fun doesn't stop there!

-> Will makes the move to play on Mack's wing🪽

in a pretty career-defining move, will decides to play on mack's wing more permanantly. this was HUGE NEWS at the beginning of the season, as will is usually a center (like mack) and was famously the center for the BC line trio. it was also contrary to what we had heard at the end of the season:

[Smith moving to the wing] is something of a surprise, given GM Mike Grier’s declaration last April that Smith, picked as a center by the San Jose Sharks in the 2023 Draft, would be returning to his original position at the beginning of the 2025-26 season.

it was an idea the sharks actually actively rejected early on in will's rookie career too:

Otherwise, the next logical step for Smith could be a positional move to wing. “I do whatever the coaches want me to do,” Smith said, noting that he hasn’t played much wing in his career. “I can figure it out pretty quick. It's part of being a forward. I need to know how to play both.” “We're not there yet. We're going to continue to work with him as a center,” Warsofsky said. “His future, I believe, is in the middle. So, we've got to continue to work on that.”

so what changed? well:

the sharks drafted center michael misa with the second-overall pick of the 2025 draft, who would be joining the lineup. he was viewed as a 'more natural' center.

will enjoyed most of his rookie season success on the wing, when he played it. he got off to somewhat of a slow start playing center, and even saw demotion to the fourth line at one point, amongst being benched.

playing wing also represents will’s best chance to play regularly with mack.

some great quotes below from this article here!

Smith, on what went into the decision to play wing more this year: We talked about it a lot over the summer. At Worlds, I was a wing and mostly last year towards the end of the year. Getting used to that and being versatile to do both, that’s something that I definitely can and want to do.

Smith, on what he likes about being on a line with Celebrini: I think our chemistry is really good. We look out for each other a lot, and it’s nice playing with a guy that can drive the play like that. He also has the vision and the shot to do it too, so it’s very nice.

also some great in depth analysis on will's *hypothetical* move to wing (at the time) on the san jose hockey now podcast (1:17:00), where sheng peng says:

"I've joked about this before, but the more I talk to people - and we've seen it - like, Mack and Will, they love each other. And literally, Will's only chance to play on a line with Mack is to play on wing, because we know Macklin's not going to wing. So, it's a real thing."

sheng also describes a 'new willingness' from will to play on the wing, as opposed to when it was mentioned earlier in the 24/25 season, 'when he didn't know he could do it' and 'playing with macklin had nothing to do with it'. this just goes to show that things obviously changed for will over the season and off-season. maybe playing with mack at the halifax camp played a factor, but i'm sure they were certainly discussing this possibility at the time too before will made the commitment.

at the time, obviously a lot of us wanted this to happen, but that didn't necessarily mean we expected it too. so when will announced he would be 'mainly be a winger' this 25/26 season, it's safe to say the news shook the timeline to its core... like what!!!

since then, will and mack have played on a combination of (often) top lines together with sharks such as graf, sherwood and toffoli. the 'willmackgraf' line was often played together as will and mack seemed to click with collin (because he plays in a similar way that they do with each other?? :) willmackgraf goal for your enjoyment.

“[Graf is] just so smart. The way he thinks the game, and he always has his head up looking for plays,” Celebrini said when asked why they work so well together. “That's something that me and Will like to do [as well]. We like to make plays and read off each other. He also has a great stick, and he's able to make those plays.”

-> Will and Mack wear matching pre-game jackets... TWICE🧥

this is kind of a fun little extra seeing as it's not enough for it's own post, lol, but!

the first instance comes on november 13th, where 'glorius custom' tailors, post will and mack wearing jackets tailored by them.

glorius custom famously tailor for a huge number of nhlers, but most notably in this case, crosby, mackinnon and letang, all of whom we know were in attendance at the cwench camp. we all then liked to assume that of course they sorted will and mack out tailor-wise whilst they were altogether in halifax with a new look. (mack has worn 'glorius' looks previously).

the next instance comes on april 12th, where will and mack walk in wearing these two very similar looking jackets and matching pants 👀 this post goes into more depth about what makes them very similiar/the same

and, well, they are! both sets are from 'suits you' custom tailors. both mack and will are featured on their client list here :) what's more, suits you was actually founded by gabe perreault's brother, jeremy, who is a tailor!

in depth post on this here: jeremy has tailored many other outfits for will especially, as gabe seems to direct all his best BC buds to his brother with his clientele including ryan leonard, jacob fowler, james hagens + also lane and cole hutson amongst many other nhlers!

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