Matthew Knies and Now Gavin McKenna: Maple Leafs Mentorship Lives On

Here’s the strangest thing about a hockey trade. Your best friends at work are also the people you’re about to compete against, and you usually get about a day’s notice. Matthew Knies was moved less than 24 hours before the season started, and somehow his old teammates still found the time to call.

The Maple Leafs Have Lost the Daily Routine, Not the Friendship.

What a trade really takes away isn’t the friendship. It’s the ordinary parts: the dressing room banter, the road trips, the team dinners, the inside jokes nobody else gets. Those happen every day, and they’re what make a friendship feel like a friendship. The phone call from Morgan Rielly, then Matthews, then Tavares, is what’s left once the daily routine disappears. It’s small, but it tells you the relationship was real.

You’ll see these people again. Knies and the Maple Leafs are in different divisions, so he’ll face them a couple of times a year, and careers in this sport cross paths over and over. Friends turn into opponents, then linemates again, then maybe coaches or broadcasters down the road. Burn a bridge in hockey, and you’ll probably have to walk across it later.

The Same Maple Leafs Veterans Are Doing It All Over Again with McKenna.

Here’s the part I find most interesting. The guys who looked after Knies when he was young didn’t stop being mentors when he left. They just got a new young player to work with. Gavin McKenna is living with John Tavares and had a sleepover at Auston Matthews’ place, and you can bet they’re passing along the same stuff Rielly and the others once shared with Knies. Mentorship in a dressing room is a relay. When one young player leaves, the veterans turn around and help the next one.

Then comes game night. The best part of a reunion is how honest it is. Everyone knows the chirping and hitting will be coming, and everyone expects a hug or a laugh in the warm-up. Then the puck drops and the friendship goes in a box for 60 minutes. You can care about someone and still want to beat him, and hockey players seem to do that better than almost anyone.

A trade changes the sweater. It doesn’t change who called you first.

Related: NHL Trade Talk Recap: Jets, Senators, Canucks & Oilers