The alleged sexual assault of Kyle Beach at the hands of former Blackhawks video coach Brad Aldrich and the subsequent inaction by numerous people in positions of power is already one of the biggest scandals in NHL history, and it is by no means a closed case yet.
Blackhawks general manager Stan Bowman and senior vice president Al MacIsaac resigned after their roles in the cover-up were exposed, as did former Chicago coach Joel Quenneville, who was most recently the Panthers’ head coach before stepping down.
The gravity of the situation has been resonating across the hockey world, including in the Bruins locker room. Forward Taylor Hall acknowledged last week that there is an “old boys’ club” mentality and culture of “secrecy” in hockey that needs to change.
On Tuesday, defenseman Brandon Carlo revealed that the team watched Beach’s interview with TSN’s Rick Westhead together at the urging of coach Bruce Cassidy and captain Patrice Bergeron, who believed it was an important thing for the team to do.
“Butchy felt it was important, Bergy. I think they had a little discussion, and I think it was a great thing for all of us to do,” Carlo said. “It was very courageous for [Beach] to come out and do all this. He’s not doing it for no reason. He’s doing it to put a stop to things like this. Once you see it, you see the emotion involved in it, and also just gain an understanding for the fact that things like this do happen. His message was obviously very clear that you don’t have to be alone in it. That was huge to see and very powerful. I think it was great that we all watched it, but also very hard to watch.”
Attention is now shifting to others outside the Blackhawks organization, with questions about what both the NHL and NHLPA knew and when they knew it. During an NHLPA meeting on Monday, executive director Donald Fehr called for an independent investigation into the NHLPA’s handling of the situation.
Beach told TSN that he reported his assault to an individual at the NHLPA and that he believes at least two people spoke to Fehr directly, but that nothing had been done and that he felt like Fehr and the NHLPA had turned their backs on him.
Carlo, who is the Bruins’ NHLPA representative, said players are taking this seriously and that they feel a responsibility to make sure a thorough investigation is conducted.
“You feel a responsibility within the players association and different things to really further investigate the knowledge and the information that was given to certain people that didn’t act accordingly in regards to making more of an effort to stand up for Kyle,” Carlo said.
Carlo added that there was “a good amount of frustration” expressed by current players during Monday’s meeting.
“Just questioning, basically, moreso what was going on, and a big responsibility to make it known that we want more of an investigation and further review of how things were handled,” Carlo said. “Overall, I think that will be accomplished. That’s very important to the players at this point, to make sure things are handled correctly and accordingly going forward, and also getting the knowledge out there of who was involved in all of this.”