NHL Teammates Who Hated Each Other
By
Richard Janvrin
Contributor Updated: 28 February 2025
Richard Janvrin Contributor
Richard has been writing about sports since he was a teenager. Still, his first professional role came in 2015, covering all things NFL and fantasy football-related. From there, in December 2018, he started in the sports betting industry, covering sportsbook reviews before arriving to where he is today.
NHL Teammates
An NHL team has 23 players, and it shouldn’t come as a surprise that some teammates simply don’t get along. However, there are times when that relationship can be even more soured, leading to some level of hatred.
This is something that we’re often not privy to when betting at NHL online sportsbooks, but this can certainly impact the outcome of games.
Below are several combinations of NHL teammates who hated each other, featuring Evander Kane multiple times.
- Evander Kane and Dustin Byfuglien
- Evander Kane and Justin Falk
- Gary Leeman and Al Iafrate
- Saku Koivu and Mike Ribeiro
- Alexei Kasatonov and Viacheslav Fetisov
Evander Kane and Dustin Byfuglien
Kicking off my list of NHL teammates who hated each other are two guys who played together for the Winnipeg Jets—Kane and Byfuglien.
Yeah, they didn’t care for each other.
It all started when Kane was scratched against Vancouver for violating the team’s dress code.
The story goes that Kane showed up to a team meeting in a tracksuit rather than a formal suit, which was the team’s rule. Well, Byfuglien wanted to make an example of Kane.
How did he do that? He got ahold of the outfit and threw it into the team’s shower. Then, just five days later, Kane was shipped out of town. He was traded to the Buffalo Sabres.
A news station interviewed Byfuglien about the incident, and he said, “You know, obviously, not the ideal spot I wanna be in right now, but we’re a team… you know, needed a guy to fill that spot, so I’m the lucky guy.”
That was in response to him throwing the outfit into the team shower.
Then, years later, Kane appeared on Fair Game with Kristine Leahy and was asked about the incident.
He confirmed that this incident got him traded, but he tried to make it clear that it wasn’t a “tracksuit,” but rather clothes that “didn’t look like this,” as he grabbed the suit that he was wearing during the interview.
Also, there were rumors that Kane also punched Blake Wheeler.
But when it comes to hockey teammates who hated each other, Kane doesn’t stop here.
Evander Kane and Justin Falk
The fun with Kane doesn’t end in Winnipeg or with Byfuglien, though. There’s more NHL teammate hate.
Kane and teammate Justin Falk fought at a team practice in 2018. Falk was known as a quiet guy, but Kane was upset at Falk for supposedly not keeping his stick down. They had not been separated after they started shoving each other.
In an interview, Kane said it was no big deal, but when Falk was asked if he’d talk to Kane about what happened, he tried to brush it off and had to go read to some kids after one of their practices.
Kane has had lengthy on-and-off ice problems, so it’s no surprise he has landed on this list twice.
Gary Leeman and Al Iafrate
OK, this story isn’t pretty, as it allegedly involves one player’s wife having an affair with another player. This is a whole new level of NHL teammate hate.
The story, again, allegedly involves Leeman having an affair with Iafrate’s wife and Iafrate being dealt with in the aftermath. There have been several iterations of this story.
See, Iafrate was an excellent defenseman for the Toronto Maple Leafs, one of their best in recent memory at the time. So, when he was traded in 1991, it was kind of out of left field.
One iteration of the story includes Iafrate finding out that the two players hate each other and are both ultimately traded.
However, Toronto traded Iafrate away first, and it’s easy to speculate that it was because Leeman was coming off a 50-goal season.
Another story involves Iafrate having teammate John Cordic punch Leeman leading to his absences throughout that 1990-91 season.
There’s even another rumor that said Iafrate’s wife slept with an additional teammate.
It’s hard to prove which, if any, of these stories is accurate, but there’s a lot of circumstantial evidence that points to something going afoul here.
Saku Koivu and Mike Ribeiro
Koivu is fondly remembered as a classy captain of the Montreal Canadiens, but there was one particular teammate he seemingly disagreed with. This is one of the more surprising instances of hockey teammates who hated each other.
This came in the 2003-04 season. At center, the team had Koivu, Ribeiro, and Tomas Plekanec.
While this could’ve been a fantastic tandem, something was going on with Koivu and Ribeiro.
Rumors are that Ribeiro was someone out mainly for himself. He thought he should be the No. 1 center ahead of Koivu.
During practice, the two got into a bit of a tussle, escalating this NHL teammate hate.
Ribeiro was interviewed and asked about the incident, but he tried to brush it off.
Well, following the fight, there were allegedly two factions in the locker room—some of the side of Koivu and some with Ribeiro. This became a distraction.
A few years later, Ribeiro said that he didn’t feel respected by Koivu or welcome by the squad.
Alexei Kasatonov and Viacheslav Fetisov
Last on my list of NHL teammates who hated each other, we have two Russian natives, Kasatonov and Fetisov.
These two were extremely close during their playing days in Russia (known as the USSR then). In fact, they were roommates and were like brothers. Shoot, Fetisov’s mother even cooked meals for Kasatonov. So it’ll come as a surprise to know that these are hockey teammates who hated each other in the end.
This relationship carried over to the ice as the two knew what each other was thinking the entire time they were playing, it seemed.
Well, there reached a point where Fetisov was drafted by the New Jersey Devils 145th overall in 1983 but was blocked by the USSR. However, years later, when he was 31, he was determined to play in the NHL.
However, it seemed that, at one point, Kasatonov was against Fetisov for trying to leave and sided with the USSR for wanting to keep him there. However, when Fetisov finally came over, so too did Kasatonov.
Fetisov was asked about Kasatonov coming over and he said, ”I don’t happy.”
Of course, English isn’t his first language, but he wasn’t thrilled. This was a different type of hockey player feud.
Fetisvo apparently said something to the effect that it wasn’t right that Kasatonov was against him for wanting to come before and now followed him. These comments were relayed by teammate Brendan Shanahan.
Shanahan said that the two didn’t speak to one another and wouldn’t take the same taxis.
Fortunately for their team, though, they were able to put aside that hockey teammate hate while on the ice and had success.
All class by both, despite hating each other, put it aside for the betterment of the team.
