Vegas trip bittersweet for widow of coach
Darcy and Christina Haugan had their plans made, plane tickets and hotel booked.
This was their annual week in Las Vegas, at a place off the strip, where Darcy worked at a hockey camp and Christina soaked up the atmosphere of a place far removed from their day-to-day reality.
“It was a free trip for the two of us, kind of our week away,” Christina said Wednesday, in the hours before Darcy was named the posthumous winner of the NHL’s Willie O’Ree Community Hero Award.
“The first couple of years we were here, it was very surreal. I made him walk so much (one week) that he literally walked a hole in his flip-flops.”
After tragedy struck — after the collision between bus and semi, after 16 travelling members of the Humboldt Broncos, including coach Darcy, died — Christina cancelled the trip.
But here she is, back in Vegas, the very same week she was supposed to walk that hot pavement with her husband. Instead, she’s watching the hockey world honour him and the team he loved to coach.
There’s an old family tale of Haugan at four years old, confiding in his grandmother.
“Grandma, I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” he said. “I just can’t stop thinking about hockey.” And the love blossomed.
“It’s a great day to be a Bronco, gentlemen,” he’d say, both when his players hit the ice, and at the close of his game-day speeches.
Crash survivor Bryce Fiske has those words on a tattoo. Teammate Tyler Smith said he just might do that, too — imprint Haugan’s words onto his skin, as a permanent reminder and as an inspiration.
“It summed him up so much,” Christina said. “He was so proud to be a coach, and he wanted them to be equally proud to be a player. He’d always tell them, ‘You guys are so lucky to be able to do this. You guys are playing hockey full time, essentially — cherish every moment of this, because it won’t last forever.’ ”
Those players still talk fondly of a snow day, back in February, when one of those colossal Saskatchewan dumps buried Humboldt in a big, white blanket. The Broncos showed up for practice, and Haugan told them to forget about pulling on their gear.
“No practice, boys,” he said. “Go shovel snow.” And did they shovel.
“First, they did pathways to the arena for the rink staff,” Christina says. “Then he sent them home to do their billets. Then they put a Tweet out, and we had calls coming in — it was crazy. They cancelled practice that day, to go shovel.”
The community served the Broncos, Haugan told his players, and now it was time to serve the community, from morning to midafternoon. The memory makes Broncos survivor Kaleb Dahlgren smile broadly. “Driveways, restaurants, walkways, we pulled people out who were stuck on the street, shovelled out vehicles and cleared snow for other businesses,” he said. “And it was really good. Instead of a hockey stick, you had a shovel. It works.”
Christina met Darcy at Briercrest Bible College, where they both studied after high school.
They were married 17 years, and had two kids — 13-year-old Carson, and nine-year-old Jackson.
They worked side-by-side with the Broncos, because after Darcy took the job in 2015, she became the team’s office manager.
“I also cook, and sew name-bars on jerseys, and sharpen skates,” she says.
On Wednesday, 10 surviving Broncos — fresh off the NHL’s redcarpet stroll — lined up on stage at the awards. Dahlgren made a speech, honouring those who couldn’t be there.
Willie O’Ree — the NHL’s first black player — announced Haugan as the winner, and Christina accepted it on stage.
“I just want people to remember him, how he was,” she said prior to the awards. “I think he deserves all the credit he can get, because he was just an incredible person. He was that same amazing person when no one was looking, as when everybody was watching.
“It didn’t matter to him. Sometimes I would be frustrated with him, be like ‘I don’t know why you invest so much in everything, why you can’t just do something kind of halfway?’ He’s like ‘No, that’s not how we’re going to do it.’ ”
On Wednesday, the surviving players on his team heard his name called, as did the crowd in the hall, and a much broader audience outside Las Vegas.
“I don’t think he ever expected any credit, or ever thought he would be recognized like this,” she said. “It means a lot. I wish he’d known, a little bit, the huge impact he did have.”
And were he here, to see this award presented?
“He’d probably just say he didn’t deserve it,” she said. “He’d probably try to give the credit to someone else. He was a pretty humble guy. I always told him he always deserved everything.”