Big Read: Linesman Pat Dapuzzo suffered one of the most gruesome on-ice injuries in NHL history. It ended his career — and maybe saved his life. This is his story. (By KrRutherford)
Brian Burke was the NHL’s executive vice president and director of hockey operations when he first got to know Dapuzzo in the early 1990s. He says the referee’s relationship with players stood out. Dapuzzo was the guy they’d ask where to find the best Italian food in New Jersey, or where to get a decent haircut.
Dapuzzo is hit by the skate of Flyers forward Steve Downie in the freak accident that ended his careerhe puck is hurtling up the boards toward Dapuzzo. Fedor Tyutin and Steve Downie are hurtling across the ice towards that puck. Dapuzzo gets out of the way as best he can, jumping to try to avoid the ensuing collision, his skates airborne, his knees tucked.
“We thought, ‘Oh, he just got a cut.’ Considering how badly he was hurt, most guys would’ve stayed down.” In all that time, the worst he felt was a day away from the biggest assignment of his career: Game 6 of the 1995 Eastern Conference Final between the Flyers and Devils. He’d been getting closer to officiating in the pinnacle of professional hockey. “I’m one step from the Cup,” he says. But the night before that assignment, he lay in his dark hotel room, throwing a pillow at the ceiling over and over again, trying to distract himself from the pounding in his head and his racing heart.
Dapuzzo told Burke he couldn’t focus, had trouble getting out of bed, his anxiety was through the roof, that he didn’t know what was wrong, that he’d never felt quite this bad. Burke sought out commissioner Gary Bettman to figure out how to get Dapuzzo help. After some digging they were referred to the psychiatrist the New York Mets employed. “I think that shrink might’ve saved Pat Dapuzzo’s life,” Burke says. Finally, Dapuzzo began to get some of the treatment and help he needed.
After one game late in the season, Dapuzzo asked McAvoy when he was leaving for Ann Arbor, Mich., for U.S. national team development camp tryouts, which were four days away. McAvoy hadn’t been invited. “He couldn’t believe it,” says McAvoy, who was disappointed, but had made his peace with the decision. Dapuzzo wasn’t ready to throw in the towel, and he told McAvoy so: “There’s no way this isn’t happening. You deserve to be there.” Dapuzzo got on his phone and one call led to another.
Three years had passed since Dapuzzo’s accident, and he’d been struggling. The year after he was injured, he rarely left his house. He didn’t feel well enough to interact much with his sons. He wouldn’t respond to most friends who called, texted or knocked on his door. And though Dapuzzo had been slowly improving, in the back of Burke’s mind, concern was one reason he wanted to see if Dapuzzo was interested in the scouting role. “But you can’t make hiring decisions based on that,” Burke says.
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