(670 The Score) Blackhawks captain Jonathan Toews publicly addressed the organization’s sexual abuse scandal Wednesday for the first time since the results of an investigation were released that shed light on how upper management mishandled and attempted to cover up sexual assault allegations made against former assistant coach Bradley Aldrich in 2010, when Chicago won the Stanley Cup.
Early Wednesday evening, former player Kyle Beach publicly revealed himself as the John Doe who had filed the sexual assault lawsuit against the Blackhawks, saying in a TSN interview that the incident “destroyed me.” Toews discussed the matter after the Blackhawks’ loss to the Maple Leafs later in the night, saying he hadn’t watched Beach’s full interview but was generally aware of his comments. Toews maintained that he didn’t know in May 2010 of the sexual assault allegations.
“At the end of the day, I don’t wish to exonerate myself from this situation in any way by saying that I didn’t know, but the truth is I had not heard about it until training camp the next year,” Toews said. “At the end of the day, it doesn’t change what happened. It doesn’t take that away. It doesn’t make it go away. I think collectively as players, if guys did know, hindsight is 20/20. I think we wish we could’ve done something differently, myself included. At the end of the day, my heart goes out to Kyle for what he dealt with and wish I could’ve done something. At the end of the day, it’s obviously not an excuse looking back, but the truth is a lot of us were focused on playing hockey and doing what we doing every single day. If you do hear rumors, it’s almost just in the back of your mind. Now when you go through the detail of it all, it looks ugly and it’s really hard to stomach the fact that you don’t dive into something like that a little bit more and take it more seriously on the spot. But it’s always easy to say in hindsight. Obviously, it’s a long time ago. But at the end of the day, I feel a ton for what Kyle went through and what he’s dealing with at this point too. I don’t know what else to say. I think the guys that were part of that group all wish they could’ve done something different.”
Toews added he never heard homophobic slurs directed at Beach by Blackhawks players. Beach asserted he was bullied and that homophobic slurs were directed at him after the the sexual abuse was reported to management, which delayed for more than three weeks before reporting the issue to human resources. Aldrich went on to sexually harass another individual during that time, the investigation found.
“I would say there was none of that here in Chicago,” Toews said of the homophobic slurs.
As the captain and team leader, Toews was also asked if he looked back differently on that 2010 championship and era.
“It puts things in perspective,” Toews said. “When you’re chasing your dream of winning the Stanley Cup, it becomes the only thing. As they say, winning is everything, and it just consumes your whole world. Obviously it was a special memory in a lot of ways, but when there’s something like this that tarnishes it, it definitely makes you realize there’s more to life than hockey. In so many ways, this is an unfortunate situation. I think winning the Stanley Cup that year is besides the point. So I think whether we won or not, do we wish this would’ve been dealt differently in some ways? Probably. Do we wish we could take it back and it never happened and young players didn’t have to deal with a situation like that? Absolutely. It’s just tough all around. It’s tough to say.”
Toews also had praise for recently ousted Blackhawks executives Stan Bowman and Al MacIsaac, who each resigned Tuesday in conjunction with the findings being released Tuesday. Bowman and MacIsaac were both in a key meeting in May 2010 in which the sexual abuse allegations were discussed.
Toews’ comment came after he was asked if his feelings changed about them.
“Make any argument you want – they’re not directly complicit in the activities that happened,” Toews said. “It’s not up to me on whether they’d like to deal with it differently or not. I just know them as people, and I’ve had a relationship and friendship with them for a long time, just being part of the Blackhawks family. People like Al and Stan have made coming to the Blackhawks for players around the league, who come here to play on this team, one of the special places to play hockey. To me, I have a ton of respect for them as people. How the situation went down, what the timeline was, what they knew, I can’t really comment on that. It’s obviously a tough day. Regardless of the mistakes that may have been made, for someone like Stan, who has done so much for the Blackhawks – and Al as well – to lose everything they care about and their livelihoods as well, it’s just, I don’t understand how that makes it go away, to just kind of delete them from existence and (say), ‘That’s it, we’ll never hear from them again.’ So I have a lot of respect for them as people. They’re good people. When it comes down to how they feel looking back on the situation, that’s not up to me to comment on.”
The Blackhawks were fined $2 million by the NHL for their mishandling of the matter and inadequately following protocols.