“These incidents, the tragedy is there and we have to learn and grow from them.”
Those are the words of Saskatoon Blades general manager Colin Priestner after the Western Hockey League (WHL) announced that neck guard protection would be a requirement for players after former NHL player Adam Johnson died.
Johnson suffered a fatal slash to the neck during the second period of a game in England over the weekend.
Neck guards will be required for any on-ice activities, at both WHL games and practices.
The guards will be required as of Friday or as soon as clubs can get their hands on the equipment.
Priestner said this wasn’t an item that was debated, adding that the messaging was clear and swift.
“Good on them, I think it was something that shouldn’t be belaboured too much,” Priestner said.
He said neck guards are flying off the shelves right now and it may take a while to get some supplied.
“Just wives looking at their husbands playing in beer league at 10:30 at night like, ‘What if that happened to you?’ You don’t see a lot of guys in men’s leagues wearing neck guards.”
He said they are in the process of looking for neck guards, but likely won’t have them for everyone by Friday, adding they’ll grab some as the supply becomes available.
“A swift response was needed.”
Priestner compared the neck guards to seatbelts, saying that some people may find them uncomfortable, but they’re needed.
“It’s just something they’ll have to get used to.”
Priestner said before the news of Johnson’s death he doesn’t recall a discussion about neck guards within the last six months.
“Sadly it sometimes takes an incident like what happened in England to drive home the perils that hockey and all sports have, especially a sport that uses sharp blades.”
“We want to do everything we can to protect players,” Priestner added.
The same sentiments can be felt among other WHL staff and players as well, with Regina Pats defenceman Parker Berge saying it was a good thing neck guards were being implemented now.
“It’s a very terrible accident that happened,” Berge said.
He said neck guards weren’t really something that anyone thought too much about before Johnson’s death.
Brad Herauf, head coach for the Pats, said he’s never seen an incident like what happened to Johnson before, that it was very unfortunate and that he’s also glad they’re implementing neck guards now.
Herauf said leagues and players are taking precautions to be as safe as they can in their sport.
He said the news came out before they could speak with their players, but they did have a chat.
“As a group we did talk about it, everyone kind of had their say, but yeah, the people with social media now, they’re on top of stuff before practice even happening,” Herauf said.
WHL Commissioner Ron Robison said the league is continuing to monitor all leagues, not just their own, when it comes to player safety.
He said a few clubs were in contact with him immediately after the weekend incident and they felt it was time to do something.
“We felt it was important to act at this time,” Robison said.
He said there was unanimous league support to implement neck guards, adding that there has been no pushback on any level.
Robison said it wasn’t just Johnson’s death that spurred this change in the league.
“It wasn’t just this tragic event, it’s been something we’ve been monitoring very closely over the past year and we felt this was just the right time to make this decision.”
He said the league reached out to their equipment suppliers on a national level, noting that companies like Bauer have been very co-operative and will be supplying them with as much equipment as they can.
“We’ve indicated to our clubs to source the material in any fashion that they possibly can and put that in place.”
— with files from Brooke Kruger
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