A summarised list of miscellaneous things that have brought us to this point (them becoming the most popular hockey rpf pairing despite this being their SECOND year) :
Less than 2 years ago they were rivals, genuinely hated each other. Nowadays they mention one another anytime the opportunity presents itself (fondly and smiling softly).
They openly and happily admit they spend most breaks together. They used to sneak out of their respective houses to have dinner together.
They‘re side by side at every anthem and skate out one after the other at every game.
They often go out to lunch, and golf, and basketball games, and sometimes broadway shows on their own. They still share hotel rooms (and anytime they had to room with someone else, they called the experience ‘strange’). They admit to being disappointed when their stalls aren’t next to each other in the locker room.
They sometimes ditch the group to play sewer soccer by themselves.
They accidentally have matching suits (and cars, and shoes)
They spend most of their free time at each other’s house and have gone through a considerable number of classic movies (not horror) and niche romcoms.
Will puts up with Mack’s white noise at night, and Mack puts up with Will’s synth pop music in the morning. They would be each other’s emergency contact. They objectively perform better on the ice if they’re on the same line.
They have a joint TikTok account. The username is both their names smashed together — wcpsmrc — and it used to be Will’s personal account. He offered it up. Instead of, yknow, making a new one.
Mack often seems to instinctively lean into / sway towards Will if they’re standing / sitting close enough.
(Not to say Will doesn't lean into Mack's space, because he does. A lot. But as far as i can tell Mack does it more often)
(i mean. look at those nfl game pictures, that man tries to have as much direct contact with Will as possible) -- (they're different pictures, i swear) -- (also peep the iron grip)
On the bench Mack tends to yap nonstop right into Will’s ear (bc personal space isn’t a thing) and Will lets him, silently nodding along.
(Mind you, on average that’s 40 minutes on the bench per game).
They look for each other after scoring. They look for each other even if they’re not the ones who scored.
Will taps Mack's ass after celebrations (I'm not fucking joking) and Mack simply smiles.
During cellys they refuse to let go of each other, even as the other guys crowd them.
Mack has an assist on all of Will’s goals. Will has an assist / was on the ice for most of Mack’s goals. They’ve already entered the top 5 scoring duos (and they weren’t even on the same line the first month of the season).
They made each other wear their college jerseys after losing a bet.
Other teammates use them as a measuring scale when explaining how close they are to other players "we're good friends but not like will and mack, those two are different".
When they get to hotels, they rarely use the TV at all because they spend too much time talking. Additionally, Toff has said sharing a wall with them during roadies is Hell because those two will be wrestling/play fighting/laughing and “making weird noises” until midnight. They also order milk and cookies every night.
When one of them is being photographed to capture that ‘tying his skates before the game’ picture, the other one is usually trying to make them laugh by being an idiot behind the camera.
They have a specific handshake they do in the locker room before skating out onto the ice
They’re together so often there are virtually no candid videos of one without the other in the background.
Mack is helping rehab Will through strength training.
Will stays nearby when Mack argues with a ref.
If they’re not sitting together on the bench, Mack constantly glances over at Will, even if someone’s talking to him.
There have been multiple instances of Will pulling a face or doing something funny in between whistles to get a laugh out of Mack (ie: pretending to eat the salts).
And they’re both pathological liars. For instance: Will often claims to be a communication student at Boston College to avoid social interaction, and Mack claims to be 6’ft.
He is, in fact, not 6’ft. He is 5’11.
Honorary mention to their banter:
“That didn’t happen” “It did happen and there’s proof” “He’s being dramatic” “There is a HOLE in my WINDSHIELD?” “There’s a small dent in your windshield, you can barely see it” “ITS THE SIZE OF YOUR FIST??”
***
(disclaimer: some of these events have been exaggerated. i am looking at it through an rpf lens)
Y’all I thought people were exaggerating about his eyes dilating in that video when he talks about Mack so I went to check for myself and ??????? OH MY GOD you can literally SEE IT happen. They get HUGE. I am unwell!!
thinking about the richard celebrini, PR management of it all. this man works in sports, he knows the power of a narrative, the reality of a story. he's seen exactly what the media does with athletes they deem arrogant or ungrateful or too intense, and he looked at his kid, who was always going to be a star, and knew he had to get ahead of it.
because mack is not traditionally arrogant or ungrateful but he's smart and self-interested. he's practical. he knows exactly how to parse through team politics and he's uncaring of sob stories or tales of triumph. he’s five steps ahead of everyone off the ice and ten steps ahead on it. he knows the shortcomings of everyone he plays with and against. more than that, everyone can tell.
but you can’t be that player in the media: motorized intensity, lethal precision, cruelty without intent to harm.
enter smith, 20.
enter all-american, boyishly charming william charles patrick smith of the comiskey white sox. he’s beautiful enough to be liked by the media without true effort, mack is too, but he’s clever enough to be beloved.
he’s grown up studying decades of sweat and tears sports heritage, of lineage, of family legend. he’s watched enough rom coms and sports biopics, seen miracle on ice with childhood fascination. he knows narrative. how to craft intrigue by withholding enough details. how to stir the mind with flashes of intimate knowledge. he comes from colleen comiskey-smith. all praise be to rick celebrini, blacksmith of athletic fortitude, but he’s no colleen.
not only does will brings the balance mack needs in his hockey, in his life, he brings the story.
everybody joshing about goody rpfing on main but you mustve forgotten that he is the single person between will and macks stalls. to him they are probably one loud annoying entity that encompass him from all sides
off the back of my marmon timeline, a lot of you guys seemed interested in learning about key willmack events, so here's everything (that i remember) that melted the timeline the last off season for you!
-> Both Will and Mack compete at Worlds 2025! 🇨🇦 🇺🇸
this was a suuuuper fun time, because both the team canada and team usa rosters were absolutely STACKED with nhlers and canada and the usa were in different group stages (also playing in two different locations: denmark and sweden), so everyone was pretty much hedging their bets on a canada-usa final!
team canada: sidney crosby, nathan mackinnon, konecny, sandheim, o’reilly, fantilli etc, AND marc-andre fleury in net who sid literally coaxed out of near-retirement for one last tournament together. this team meant business!
team usa: clayton keller, tage thompson, brady skjei, swayman and daccord in net. this team meant business too - they were looking to win their first tournament in NINETY TWO years!
will was also surrounded by his friends such as zeev buium, matty beniers, cutter gauthier, and logan cooley (yes, mack's nemesis from the mammoth)...
this would have been the first time will and mack played each other since facing off in the ncaa hockey east final where bc triumphed over bu 6-2 (and more importantly will had FOUR goals and an assist in comparison to mack's one goal). so they were both super excited at the opportunity to play against each other:
“Yeah, I am,” Smith said with a big smile, excited about potentially playing against Celebrini.
Celebrini said he’s excited to play against his best friend and San Jose Sharks teammate.
the iihf also had will and mack record messages for each other, prior to the tournament and edited them together so it’s like they’re talking to each other (!)
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 quarter 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 quarterfinal in denmark and apparently were so convinced that they would be making the semis, 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 at this point after team usa beat sweden to get into the final, 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 against switzerland, and 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!
toff, mack and aiden also trained together :)
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 literally 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! :) seems to have been removed elsewhere online?
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 to. 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!
———
so that brings us to the end of some of the 24/25 off-season and its related madness! that’s not even everything really, but definitely hits the main points if you weren’t around back then i hope! :)
