2026 Is For Fighting

The new year is not yet three weeks old, but it is already rife with signs. Signs and portents. I have examined the flights of birds. I have consulted with the Pythia at Delphi (she says hello). I have completed a correspondence course and trained my newly certified haruspex skills upon the nearest sheep liver. The universe is trying to tell us something.

It began, as it often does, with the children. Out of the fists of babes, as the King James Version nearly says. Last weekend, a local youth hockey league was selected to be the Mites on Ice at an AHL game, having a quick game of shinny during the Hershey Bears' intermission. This is common enough. So too, is people from Pennsylvania engaging in antisocial behaviors. But the combination of the two was something new: a line brawl featuring children.

Those 8-and-unders were really whaling on each other! One kid got so riled up he started pummeling his own teammate. If you've watched any youth hockey before, you know these fisticuffs were staged by the fact that no one jumped in to separate the skirmish schoolboys. But the extent of the conspiracy is still unclear. The owner and president of the youth league put out a statement claiming that no adult took part in planning the fighting, and instead the children interpreted their moment in the spotlight as "show time." Still, the governing body is investigating.

Is it possible the children could sense a change in the air? Possible, and likely, if you consult this humble oracle. This past weekend was rich with hockey fights where hockey fights don't typically occur. On Friday, Boston University sophomore and Blackhawks 2024 first-rounder Sacha Boisvert traded serious blows with UMass Lowell senior Connor Eddy.

Fighting is illegal in college hockey and strictly enforced. Both players were automatically ejected and suspended for three games. Which meant, in practice, that they free on Sunday afternoon to watch something even rarer than a college hockey fight: a PWHL line brawl. The Sirens eked out a win over the Victoire, highlighted by desperate last-second Montreal attempts to tie the game. That generated some bad blood, and once the horn surrounded, it was go time.

New York's Taylor Girard is suspended four games for leaving the bench.

So, a week of unconventional hockey fights. If it were those three alone, it could be left to clerics and scholars to argue over its meaning, and written off as coincidence by skeptics. But Sunday night gifted us the grandest, rarest form of hockey fight: the goalie fight.

With 14 minutes remaining in San Jose's 4-1 win in Florida, a scrum along the end boards absorbed and assimilated Sharks goalie Alex Nedeljkovic, already known for not sticking to his crease. When Nedeljkovic began throwing punches, that served as permission for Sergei Bobrovsky to skate the length of the ice and confront his carapaced counterpart. Ned and Bob, have at it:

Decent form! Points off Bobrovsky for not squaring up first, giving both men time to shed their gloves and masks, but solid nonetheless. I'm awarding the fight to Nedeljkovic, who more than held his own despite Bobrovsky catching him semi-unawares. "I didn’t really expect consequences of doing it, to be honest with you," Nedeljkovic said. "I got a little surprised when he came down. But I would do it all over again."

Of course he would. Because something is in the air, or in the water. Hockey men, women, and children around the country are shedding their gloves and inhibitions, and laying into each other with both vim and vigor. The old conventions are falling away; in this new year, new ways are fighting to be born. I cannot begin to guess what this all signifies; I can only read the signs I'm given. Watch the skies!