Thinking about how Ilya’s career achievements are tied to his personal narrative while Shane’s just … are. Like, there’s nothing wrong with either of these approaches but using one for each lead only feeds into the inherent bias the book has towards Ilya.
Ilya losing rookie of the year is tied to angst about going home, going out early at the olympics is tied to angst about being home, and therefore his cup win that year feels like a victorious and deserved comeback after that failure. Doing badly with the cens is part of his sacrifice for love and a factor of his depression.
Then with Shane, winning rookie of the year gets made into a moment of him being unaware of Ilya’s struggles, a good amount of the fandom don’t even know if he won gold or silver medal, and his back to back cup wins are glossed over, as is his third one.
It is only natural then, that Ilya arrives at his happy ending alongside arriving at a good place in his career. He can be out and his mental health is doing better while his team becomes competitive and he gets to play with his husband. The audience is meant to feel happy for him for both, and meant to feel like his hockey achievements are deserved and earned because they come with his development as a character.
Shane on the other hand arrives at this ending through being professionally humiliated. He loses his reputation, his team’s respect, and he’s basically forced to move from the team he created a dynasty with and take a big pay cut. But because the romantic plot takes precedence over hockey, Shane’s career being so narratively disconnected from his personal life means this isn’t addressed or treated as the serious loss it is.
Instead, the simultaneous professional success of Ilya and failure of Shane is wrapped in the same ending. And ultimately the audience is meant to view this as happy without taking time for what Shane has lost, because the book is only set up to create empathy and connection with Ilya’s career.
