Pucks and masks prevalent, 24 NHL teams open camp
St. Louis Blues goalie Jordan Binnington is so accustomed to wearing a mask, he didn’t mind doing so for the past four months during the coronavirus pandemic.
“Sometimes, I forgot I’m wearing it while driving,” Binnington said Monday, when the Blues were among the NHL’s 24 teams to open training camp for the upcoming playoffs. “You make fun of those people who are driving by themselves with a mask on, but I sometimes forget.”
Goalies weren’t the only ones wearing masks as the NHL hit the ice, en masse, in the first full glimpse of hockey’s return since the regular season was placed on pause March 12.
Masked equipment managers patrolled the benches, clearing them of water bottles and towels following practices. In Nashville, general manager David Poile, 70, wore one while watching the Predators practice from a private suite.
And in Dallas, Stars interim coach Rick Bowness wore a mask while observing practice from an empty bench. At 65, he wasn’t taking any chances.
“I was going to err on the side of caution. I’m still very nervous about the COVID, and we haven’t tested our players since last Thursday,” Bowness said. Once results come back, he intends to return to the ice, perhaps as early as Wednesday
Players and staff all have their eyes on resuming the season with an expanded 24-team playoff set to begin in two hub cities — Toronto and Edmonton, Alberta, — on Aug. 1.
Players and everyone else who will be spending up to two months inside the “bubble” — including hotel staff, bus drivers and arena workers — will have no other choice but to get accustomed to the new reality if the NHL hopes to complete its most unique season.
Once games resume, they will be played in empty arenas, with as many as three games played per day at each site, and with the Stanley Cup awarded in late September at the earliest.
There is no guarantee the league will be able to pull it off.
Though the familiar sound of pucks, skates and sticks echoed through arenas once again, the reminders of COVID-19 were
Calgary Flames’ players take to the ice during practice in Calgary, Alberta, on Monday. also prevalent.
The NHL announced that 43 players had tested positive for the coronavirus from June 8 through the end of the league’s optional workouts. In Toronto, star forward Auston Matthews confirmed he tested positive while spending the break at his home in Arizona last month.
Golf
PGA TOUR EVENTS CONTINUE WITHOUT FANS REST OF SEASON » The PGA Tour’s three playoff events will be played without spectators, closing the door on opportunities for fans to attend Tour events the rest of the season. The Northern Trust, BMW Championship and season-ending Tour Championship, where the FedEx Cup will be awarded, announced Monday that no fans will be allowed as the nation continues to grapple with the coronavirus pandemic.
The Wyndham Championship, which concludes the regular season, also will not have fans on site when it is played Aug. 1316 in Greensboro, North Carolina. The remaining five events on the season calendar also will not have fans.
Motorsports
STEWART AND EVERNHAM TEAM TO RECREATE IROC SERIES » Remember the old IROC Series, where the best drivers from various disciplines raced each other in equally prepared cars? It ran for 30 seasons before Tony Stewart won its final championship in 2006 and the series quietly went away.
Now Stewart, along with fellow NASCAR Hall of Famer Ray Evernaham, has teamed with a group of heavyweights to bring an all-star circuit back in 2021. The Superstar Racing Experience plans a sixrace, short-track series to air in prime time on CBS in a Saturday night summer spectacular.
SRX envisions fields of 12 drivers competing on famed short tracks across the country in cars prepared by Evernham, the architect of Jeff Gordon’s early career and a noted car designer.
Stewart plans to be one of the participants and already has a wish list of drivers he’ll pursue, and he’ll likely offer up Eldora Speedway, his short track in Ohio, as one of the venues.
College athletics
PATRIOT LEAGUE PUSHES SPORTS TO SPRING » The Patriot League said its 10 Division I schools will not compete in any fall sports, which include football, men’s and women’s soccer, women’s volleyball and field hockey.
The council of presidents said the league will consider making up those seasons in the winter and spring if possible.
Army and Navy are also Patriot League members, but not in football.
TEXAS KEEPS ‘THE EYES OF TEXAS’ » The University of Texas announced a series of steps intended to make itself more welcoming to its Black students but stopped short of shelving “The Eyes of Texas” song that a number of athletes have said needs to go because it has racist undertones.
Jay Hartzell, the interim president of the university’s flagship campus in Austin, said the song will continue to be the alma mater for the Longhorns.
“The Eyes of Texas” has long been criticized for its connection to minstrel shows with characters in blackface in the early 1900s. It is sung at most organized campus events, and players in all sports gather as a team to sing it after every game.