Sens analyst Wilson tests positive for COVID-19

The news didn’t catch Gord Wilson by surprise.

After being tested for COVID -19 last week, the longtime colour analyst on TSN 1200’s Ottawa Senators broadcasts got a call from Ottawa Public Health Friday to confirm he has the novel coronavirus.

The 59-year-old Wilson, who hasn’t missed many broadcasts with partner Dean Brown since the Senators returned to the NHL in 1992, wasn’t feeling well a couple days after the team returned from its trip through San Jose, Anaheim and Los Angeles from March 6-12.

After speaking to his wife, CTV Ottawa’s Patricia Boal, Wilson made the decision to go to the Brewer Park coronavirus assessment centre.

Boal informed people of the diagnosis on CTV Ottawa’s newscast Friday night and Wilson, a father of four, has been self-isolating at home since the Senators returned from California.

“It’s hit me hard enough,” Wilson said from the couple’s Ottawa home, where he’s been staying in a bedroom away from his family and eating meals separately. “I haven’t felt good for two weeks. The worst was last weekend. So I’m hitting a week here at least with shortness of breath and feeling lethargic. I walk up a flight of steps here and I’m out of breath.

“The biggest thing is the lack of taste and smell. I’m down about eight or nine pounds. I’m not eating as much.”

Wilson is the third person in the group of 52 people aboard the Senators charter on the western U.S. road trip that has tested positive for the virus.

“It’s a flu like nothing I’ve ever had,” Wilson said. “We’ve all had the flu and we’ve all had bad colds. This is completely different ... completely different. It grips you.”

The Senators confirmed two unnamed players are in self-isolation and indicated that eight people with symptoms aboard the plane were tested.

“I went and got tested because I was feeling so run down from California and it was as much a fear for Trish going into work as anything,” said Wilson. “I was starting to feel pretty low mid-week and that’s when they told Trish that they would do the news from our backyard.

“We’re all internet doctors. You read the symptoms and I’m checking them off as I’m reading along. Okay, yeah, I’ve got a runny nose. Okay, yeah, I’ve got pressure on the chest. Okay, yes, I’m out of breath. Have I had the chills? Yes, occasionally. Muscle aches? Yes, for sure.”

The last couple of months haven’t been easy for Wilson. He had heart surgery that required three stents in February at the Ottawa Heart Institute and the trip to California was about a week after his return to the broadcast booth. The timing couldn’t have been worse.

“My immune system was down and you wouldn’t have recognized me in California because I didn’t leave my hotel room in any of the spots. I might as well have been in self-isolation back then before it became fashionable,” he said. “I thought it was a cold and I thought, ‘I’ve probably come back to work too soon here.’

“I got through it and everything was fine. I felt OK on the Friday when I got home and then I had a hard time getting through it.” bgarrioch@postmedia.com