Johnston: Coyotes players faced with ‘mental warfare,’ uncertainty as potential

What had already been a long, punishing season for members of the Arizona Coyotes turned downright cruel on Wednesday when the floodgates opened on news of the NHL’s ongoing discussions to potentially relocate the team to Salt Lake City.

The news broke hours before Game 79 of a campaign that has been incredibly trying on Coyotes players and staff. Not only have they continued to play out of a spartan college facility where they aren’t the primary tenant, but they’ve done so amid a swirl of different reports and rumors about the future of the franchise.

The weight of that had already been crashing down on players over the past several months, according to former teammate Matt Dumba, who was traded from the Coyotes to the Tampa Bay Lightning on March 8.

“It’s definitely being felt,” Dumba told The Athletic. “It’s being felt every day you step into the Mullett (Arena). It’s not easy for those guys. I feel for them. The uncertainty of what’s going to happen ahead — I mean, it can just linger, you know? When stuff doesn’t go good, it’s a little more prevalent.

“It’s a bit of mental warfare for those guys.”

The Coyotes’ future still hasn’t been settled — players have been told they could remain at the 4,600-seat Mullett Arena in Tempe next season if the current talks about relocating to Utah break down, according to multiple sources close to the situation — and so it couldn’t have been easy for them to take the ice in Vancouver on Wednesday night with the topic now an open public conversation.

Still, they won 4-3 in overtime and left all of their talking on the ice: The team’s public-relations staff defied NHL regulations by keeping the dressing room closed after the game and only made Logan Cooley available to the team’s own TV reporter.

Arizona didn’t hold a practice in Edmonton on Thursday and will face the Oilers there on Friday.

Speculation around a possible Coyotes move intensified in late January after the Smith Entertainment Group submitted a formal request to the NHL asking the league to open an expansion process so that it could bring a team to Utah. It noted that they could accommodate a NHL team as soon as the 2024-25 season, using the Delta Center on an interim basis while a new arena is constructed.

A week later, NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh teed off on Arizona’s inability to make progress on a new arena of its own while speaking to reporters during the NHL’s All-Star Weekend: “The next deadline for me is tomorrow. It’s now. It’s right now.”

All of that coincided with the start of a stretch that sunk the Coyotes’ season. Dumba believes the Coyotes played some good hockey during that 0-12-2 run from Jan. 24 to Feb. 29 but were hampered by the growing number of off-ice distractions.

“Just the uncertainty. Not knowing,” said Dumba. “I don’t think anyone knows. It’s tough for guys with families or guys who have been down there a long time and have their…