Sidney Crosby Sidney Crosby’s elite leadership skills have been chronicled over the years, and the Pittsburgh Penguins captain certainly has seen arguably more than his share of scary situations in more than two decades, involving teammates and the organization’s extended family. The latest happened this week, when 19-year-old Ben Kindel collapsed on the team plane Tuesday just after takeoff from Salt Lake City, Utah.
Kindel had a vasovagal episode, according to Penguins GM Kyle Dubas. It’s not as serious as a potential worst-case scenario, but it was still yet another tough situation for the Penguins to deal with.
“Those aren’t things you can plan for,” Crosby said. “There’s no blueprint for how you deal with it.
We lean on each other, and we try to support each other. Having a tight-knit group, I think that stuff just happens naturally, but I think it’s elevated when something happens.
I think everyone wants to do their part to help and support.” In his years with the Penguins, Crosby, 39, has had teammates who have had strokes, cancer, blood clots, the mumps, family tragedies – not to mention more directly hockey-related issues, such as surgeries and concussions, the latter of which Crosby dealt with for many months during the prime years of his career.
So what kicks in for someone who has been described as one of sports’ top captains when his “work family” is going through something scary or tragic? “The experience helps,” Crosby said.
“I don’t think it ever guarantees you’re going to know exactly what to do, but I think going through enough situations – whether it’s personally or friends or knowing certain situations – the common thing is just everyone being there for each other and trying to help each other through it.” The Penguins locker room at the UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex following Thursday’s morning skate seemed to have a normal feel to it, perhaps because Kindel escaped something dire, had returned to Pittsburgh, and was at the rink.
“For a second, you put hockey aside,” forward Blake Lizzotte said. Penguins defenseman Erik Karlsson said he had never seen a medical emergency on a team plane before.
“It was an experience that, hopefully, no one else has to go through again,” Karlsson said, “Unexpected. Obviously, not ideal.
Happy that everything is all right and we’re moving on from that. Glad to see that ‘Kindy’ is here today and in good spirits.” The relief in knowing Kindel’s situation isn’t dire allows the Penguins to focus on games, beginning Thursday night when they return home to face Florida after a disastrous four-game, four-loss road trip.
“Right now, once we’re skating, once we’re here and we’re doing the regular stuff that we do on a regular basis, it’s easy to kind of just focus on that,” Karlsson said. “And in between, everyone copes with it differently.
At the end of the day, everybody’s all right. It’s a scary situation that we went through.
At the end of the day we’re just happy that Kindy is all right. He’s back with us, and he’ll be an important part of this team moving forward.”
