The All-Star Petition Carries
Le Council has processed the petition. Le Council notes, for the record it exists to keep, that it did not expect this particular filing to reach threshold, and that having reached threshold, it leaves Le Council with no procedural grounds to decline. The community asked for an exhibition. The paperwork is in order. Le Council is therefore granting one, in the only capacity Le Council has ever truly held: that of the party who writes it down and then schedules it.
What This Is
An exhibition. Le Council wishes to be exact about the word, because the word is doing the work. Nothing that happens in either of these two games touches the standings, the bracket, or any team's record. No points are awarded. No club rises or falls. The table does not so much as notice.
What it touches is the two Conférences—the Verglas and the Givre, newly named and newly divided—which, for the first time, will each field a single side drawn from across its arenas. The clear ice against the pale. One squad of the season's best from the Verglas, one from the Givre, assembled out of players who spend every other night trying to beat one another.
Two games, on the two nights following the Final:
- Game One — All-Stars Verglas host, on the clear ice of The Watch Station, Anchorage.
- Game Two — All-Stars Givre host, beneath The Stone Opera, Prague.
Each side hosts once. Le Council considers this equitable and will not be entertaining correspondence on the matter.
How the Sides Were Chosen
The regular season, and only the regular season. Le Council counted goals and assists for the skaters and save rate for the goaltenders, across the forty-six matchdays that count and none of the postseason nights that do not. Two further rules were imposed on the count, by petition and by Le Council's own preference for the appearance of fairness:
- Every club that iced a player is represented. No arena watches its own conference take the ice without one of its own on the bench.
- No club sends more than three. A dynasty may be a dynasty on its own time. It does not get to be a dynasty here as well.
The remaining places went to the leaders, in order, until the benches were full. Fifteen a side. Three forward lines, two defensive pairs, two goaltenders.
La Conférence du Verglas
| Line | Left Wing | Centre | Right Wing |
|---|---|---|---|
| F1 | Jean-François Tremblay (Montréal Maples) | Valentina Ospina (Medellín Mapaches) | Cyril Hynes (Gander Geese) |
| F2 | Matías Fernández (Ushuaia Undertow) | Riley Dawson (Perth Pyres) | Yuna Kang (Busan Blizzards) |
| F3 | Lázaro Valdés (Havana Hammers) | Bryce Denison (Anchorage Auroras) | Mereana Brooke (Wellington Whales) |
| Pair | Defence |
|---|---|
| D1 | Ingrid Solheim (McMurdo Monoliths) · Andrés Rojas (Guadalajara Gatos) |
| D2 | Curtis Favel (Winnipeg Wendigos) · Felipe Carvalho (São Paulo Serpents) |
In goal: Kōki Yamazaki (Tokyo Titans), starting, and Carolina Agudelo (Medellín Mapaches).
La Conférence du Givre
| Line | Left Wing | Centre | Right Wing |
|---|---|---|---|
| F1 | Axel Lindqvist (Stockholm Sirens) | Naledi Khumalo (Johannesburg Jaguars) | Martin Procházka (Prague Phantoms) |
| F2 | Thabo Mokoena (Johannesburg Jaguars) | Nour El-Sayed (Cairo Crocodiles) | Rohan Deshmukh (Mumbai Monsoons) |
| F3 | Nikita Sorokin (Vladivostok Vodkas) | Ibrahima Sarr (Dakar Djinns) | Filip Nyström (Stockholm Sirens) |
| Pair | Defence |
|---|---|
| D1 | Pieter Botha (Johannesburg Jaguars) · Rahul Nair (Mumbai Monsoons) |
| D2 | Amara Osei (Nairobi Narwhals) · Erik Johansson (Helsinki Howlers) |
In goal: Mila Fedorova (Vladivostok Vodkas), starting, and Andrea Vitale (Rimini Rinklers).
Wagering
The lines are open. Le Council reminds the interested that an exhibition still resolves to a score, and a score still settles a wager, and that Looneys placed on an all-star night spend exactly as well as any others—no better, and no worse. The books close at puck drop.
Le Council did not build the two Conférences; Le Council merely read which side each arena was standing on. It did not choose these thirty players either. It read the season back and wrote down the names at the top. The game, as ever, continues—and for two nights, it continues without keeping score of anything that lasts.
The Horn will sound when it begins.