Ryan: A stark reminder of brutal reality of pro hockey - and the ‘humanity’ that unites those on the ice

It looked like one of the many hits that one sees over the grueling course of a hockey game. 

As David Backes collided with an Ottawa Senators skater near the Bruins blue line, the play continued. Dylan DeMelo corralled the puck that Backes had lofted into Ottawa’s zone and spun on a dime. 

The Sens defenseman was looking for an outlet to feed the biscuit back up into the neutral zone, but a whistle stopped him dead in his tracks.

The on-ice official’s blaring signal halted play — and signaled a cascade of silence that swept over TD Garden in one large swoop on Saturday night. 

What was a raucous barn just two minutes earlier after David Pastrnak lit the lamp felt more like a Sunday service — with hushed whispers from the crowd serving as faint echos that someone carried in the massive building. 

"It's a pretty lively building and I think you could see that everyone was shook up out there,” Senators defenseman Mark Borowiecki said. 

Backes immediately waved for help — with both Bruins and Senators skaters quickly joining him. Backes dropped to his knee, looking for some sort of response from the other party in his on-ice collision. 

Scott Sabourin, a 27-year-old winger playing in just his 11th career game up in the NHL, was not moving. 



Backes took a deep breath on the ice, trying to steady himself following the hit while trying to hold back tears. He received a couple of taps from friend and foe alike, as more Senators skated over to check on their teammate. 

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Chris Wagner skated up behind Backes to survey the scene. Both Wagner and Sabourin, as fourth-line wingers, were expected to trade blows against one another throughout Saturday’s game. But off the ice, both players go back long before the NHL — as they spent a season together with the San Diego Gulls of the AHL back in 2016. 

After seven seasons down in the American League, Sabourin finally managed to crack a roster with the Senators in 2019. 

“It sucks. Great kid, too,” Wagner said of Sabourin. “Played with him a couple times in San Diego, golfed with him a lot. Became pretty tight. I just hope nothing but the best."

As Borowiecki skated over to the Zamboni entrance to help medical staff bring out the stretcher, both Bruins and Ottawa officials tended to Sabourin. His collision with Backes, as ordinary as it looked at normal speed, was anything but. When the winger made contact with Backes, the initial hit appeared to knock him out entirely. Unable to brace his fall, he collided face-first with the ice, with blood quickly pooling near the blue line.

Backes and Wagner remained by Sabourin, as staff started to shift the fallen skater onto the stretcher. Many on the Bruins’ bench were either hunched over the boards or knelt on the ice next to their teammates. 

“I mean, we’re trying to say all the buzzwords,” Bruce Cassidy said. “But listen, both teams I think are a little bit off, a little bit shaken.”

“When someone you care about and someone who's your brother goes down like that — we're all human out there, they are too,” Borowiecki added. “I'm sure they were just as shook up as us."

As Sabourin was strapped into the spinal board, Zdeno Chara, Brad Marchand and Patrice Bergeron joined Backes, Wagner and the mass of Ottawa skaters huddled around him. Backes, stared ahead, still shellshocked at what transpired. Minutes later, the Bruins veteran would eventually head down the tunnel and not return for the remainder of the contest. Boston tabbed it as an upper-body injury. 

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“I can't imagine, mentally,” Wagner said of Backes’ reaction. "Nothing like that has ever happened to me. I tried to tell him that it's not his fault, it's a hockey play. I really feel for him.”

With an ambulance waiting, Sabourin was eased into the stretcher, with the Senators emptying their bench to send their teammate off right.

The stick taps started, and a solemn crowd at TD Garden started to erupt with cheers as the injured Senator was taken off the sheet of ice. Sabourin, who regained consciousness, managed to give a thumbs-up as his teammates passed along words of encouragement and support.

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The line of red and white continued as Sabourin was pushed along the boards — before eventually turning into a string of black and gold. Before he was taken away, Boston’s bench also emptied, with every Bruin joining the line to check in on Scott Sabourin — not the Ottawa Senators forward, but the fellow hockey player. 

"I think probably in any sport, for that matter — If something like so serious like that happens, I think the humanity takes over," Tuukka Rask said. "You forget about the team for a minute there."

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For all that transpired during those 10-plus minutes, Boston's eventual 5-2 win over the Senators was far from subdued as the contest progressed.

Brady Tkachuk scrapped down low whenever he hopped over the boards. Marchand had the rare distinction of earning six minutes worth of penalties in one sitting after getting into a kerfuffle with DeMelo and Nick Paul. Fair to say, there was no love lost between these divisional foes as soon as the puck dropped once again on the Garden ice.

But, for that brief, harrowing stretch of time, the colors on the sweater meant very little to all out on the ice — a group of men united by a love for this brutal, beautiful game.

"This is a sport with a lot of competition and at times animosity and hatred and all that," Borowiecki said. "But at the end of the day, we're all brothers in this game. We're all doing this because we love this sport. It's our livelihood and that could have just as easily been one of us. ... It shows the respect we all have for each other.

"You know how I feel about hockey players," Cassidy added. "I think they’re some of the best human beings I’ve ever been around."