“They couldn’t have waited a day?” Mark Scheifele joked, breaking the tension. What were the odds that he’d be doing interviews at the NHL Player Media Tour in Vegas just hours after the Winnipeg Jets announced they’d stripped Blake Wheeler of the captaincy? Scheifele barely had time to process the news.

Earlier Friday, the Jets released a statement revealing that Wheeler, their captain since 2016, had been removed from the role.

“It is the determination of the coaching staff that we will enter the 2022–23 season without a specific captain, but rather a group of assistants still to be determined,” new coach Rick Bowness said in the statement. “It is our goal to expand the leadership base within our hockey team.

But if Scheifele’s words Friday were any indication, that “expanded” leadership base didn’t have a say in the decision to strip Wheeler of the ‘C.’ Either that, or the Jets don’t consider Scheifele part of that leadership base, as he was pretty much in the dark about the news.