Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Injured Patrick heading home, but only for official visit
VOORHEES, N.J. » Nolan Patrick will go back home to Winnipeg this week, the place that saw him turn into his country’s top teen-aged hockey prospect, the town in which he learned his advanced skills of shooting, skating, playmaking ... and not sewing.
Patrick, you see, remembers exactly where he was and what he was doing when his hometown got its hockey team back.
“I was in Grade 8 when they got the team,” Patrick said about the born-again Jets, who will face Patrick and the visiting Flyers Thursday night. “It was pretty exciting. I remember I was in Home Ec class, sewing. That’s when I found out that the team was coming back.
“It was obviously pretty cool for Winnipeg. Everyone in the city was pretty fired up about that. I was making some brutal sweater, I think. (Home Economics) was a requirement in Grade 8. I wouldn’t have been picking that.”
Patrick went on to major in hockey, not much of a surprise since his father, Steve, and uncle James Patrick both had distinguished NHL careers.
But Nolan’s budding career has been on hold for the last three weeks, after knocking his head into the glass in an Oct. 24 game against the Anaheim Ducks and quite obviously needing time to clear his head afterward.
In the finest tradition of Flyers medical information news, he declined to answer Monday when asked if this was his first concussion. Regardless, the No. 2 overall pick in the June draft is determined to put the injury behind him as quickly as possible.
Patrick practiced with the club at the Skate Zone for the first time Monday since suffering the injury. He had been skating on his own for several days there.
“Fun to get back out there and be part of the team again,” Patrick said afterward. “It was a pretty short skate but it felt good.”
As for when he thought he might return, Patrick said, “It’s not really up to me; it’s up to the coaching staff, the trainers,” and general manager Ron Hextall.
“They have more answers than I do,” Patrick said.
But it isn’t likely he’ll get the answer he wants to hear later this week. Although Patrick is going on the road trip with the Flyers, he’s certain to be held out of the Tuesday night game in Minnesota and is likely to sit out again when the club plays two nights later in Winnipeg.
“It’s frustrating for anyone when you’re injured,” Patrick said, “but I’m trying to stay positive, not think of it that way. Just come back and try to contribute as much as I can.”
Aside from practicing with his teammates, he’ll at least have other things to keep him occupied.
“I’ll be on the trip ... I’ll see some family and friends,” Patrick said. “Hopefully I’m ready to go. It would be pretty cool to play in my hometown.”
He said his father, mother, sister and “a few of my buddies” are going to the game. The Patrick family, Nolan said, lives just 10 or 15 minutes “down the main road there” from Bell MTS Place.
But if Patrick wasn’t watching from the press box in a standard issue injured player suit, he probably wouldn’t be on hand for the game.
“I was never a Jets fan,” Patrick said. When asked what team he rooted for, he said, “Wherever my uncle (James) is coaching.”
The original Winnipeg Jets, the teams of Bobby Hull, Dale Hawerchuk and Keith Tkachuk, among other stars, put in 25 years of WHA and NHL hockey before being moved to Phoenix in 1996. Patrick wasn’t born as yet.
And though he remembers the thrill his fellow Winnipeg citizens (Winnies? Winnipeggers? Winnipegonians?) felt when the Atlanta Thrashers relocated to their town in 2011, Patrick said he isn’t really a part of that ... and really never was.
Of course, you can add the Flyers to that list now, even if Patrick needs to remember how it feels to be a part of their team again.
“It’s not that fun skating by yourself,” Patrick said. “I’m happy to get back out there. You want to be around the guys as much as you can; be on the road, be in the dressing room, be a part of the team. ... Obviously it sucks, but being frustrated about it is not going to help you heal any faster.”