Winnipeg hockey player's death linked to alcohol

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Jordan Mistelbacher (centre) with parents, Mark and Lynne Mistelbacher, at a game in November. (FAMILY HANDOUT)

There's a belated birthday cake sitting on a kitchen table that Lynne Mistelbacher won't get around to icing for her younger son.

On Tuesday afternoon, city police met with the woman and told her that her son, Jordan Mark Mistelbacher, was dead.

Family members are mourning a young man they described as remarkable, whose death, they say, is tied to the overconsumption of alcohol after he went out partying Monday night to celebrate his 19th birthday.

His body was found in a Southdale home Tuesday at noon.

The cause of his death is undetermined, said a Winnipeg police spokesman Wednesday, adding the death is being investigated by officers as non-suspicious.

Lynne Mistelbacher said Wednesday she believes her son's death is accidental.

She said Jordan had returned from Everett, Wash., to Winnipeg on Sunday to join the Manitoba Junior Hockey League's Winnipeg Saints, adding the 6-2, nearly 220-pound teen had bright hopes for the rest of the hockey season.

"He was always trying to make us be proud of him," said Mark Mistelbacher, Jordan's father, who admitted he's in a state of shock.

The parents said they were devastated their previously healthy son -- who played hockey with Team Manitoba at the 2007 Canada Winter Games in Whitehorse, Yukon -- is dead.

In 2005, Mistelbacher was a standout with the bantam Winnipeg Warriors when he was drafted by the Western Hockey League's Swift Current Broncos. He was traded in 2007 to the Everett Silvertips and split the 2007-08 season between the Silvertips and the Saints.

He had four goals and two assists in 26 games this WHL season before being reassigned to the Saints on Saturday.

"He was going to start over," said Lynne, adding Jordan wanted more ice time and hoped to be part of a championship run with the Saints.

She said the family awaits more details of their son's death.

Jordan had previously suffered concussions, said Mark, while Lynne said the young man went out to city bars with friends the night he died.

However, they said, until the provincial medical examiner tells them the exact cause of death, it remains a mystery. Currently, toxicology tests are being done.

"We're waiting for the truth from them," said Mark. "We want to know."

On his birthday Sunday, Jordan spent hours in the Vancouver International Airport -- reassigned by the Silvertips after playing a portion of the season on right wing for the WHL club. Mark Mistelbacher said his son was excited to come back to his home town, especially since he is very close with his family, particularly 21-year-old brother, Tyler, also a noted city hockey player who previously played for the Saints.

"It feels like he's still here and he's going to walk through the door any minute, and he's not," said Jordan's 17-year-old sister, Brittany.

The Mistelbachers are a hockey family that knows both the bonuses and tolls of boys intimately involved in the game of hockey.

There are the carefully clipped newspaper stories proudly displayed of Jordan and Tyler on a garage fridge -- playfully nicknamed "The Mistel attack."

There are also piles of souvenirs to mark Jordan's achievements.

Junior hockey could be stressful, said Lynne, but other family members said Jordan had a remarkable sense of humour that led him to kid around with his siblings and friends. An outdoor and animal lover, Jordan was hailed by family as a natural athlete -- one they still can't believe is dead.

His death has sent shock waves through his large circle of friends.

By late Wednesday, nearly 900 people had joined a Facebook site created in his memory.

"No one could make a bunch of guys laugh like you could Jordy. Your skills on the ice were amazing but your magic in the room was one of a kind. No one can ever take away what you did in your short time," wrote one friend and former teammate.

Members of the Silvertips and Saints junior hockey clubs also expressed their grief Wednesday.

"It's almost impossible to describe how you feel. It's an empty, very empty saddened feeling," said Saints coach Doug Stokes.

A funeral will be held for Jordan this Monday at St. Bernadette Parish.

-- with file from Meghan Hurley

gabrielle.giroday@freepress.mb.ca

Young people still consuming alcohol in troubling numbers

AUTHORITIES have tried in recent years to curb alcohol consumption among young people, but studies continue to show troubling numbers.

A survey of almost 5,000 Manitoba middle- and high-school students in 2007 found 13.4 per cent of Grade 11 students and 16.9 per cent of Grade 12 students were consuming alcohol at least once a week.

In fact, 9.8 per cent of Grade 11 students and 8.3 per cent of those in Grade 12 were consuming alcohol two to three times per week.

The study was conducted by the Addictions Foundation of Manitoba.

When the study looked at the number of alcoholic drinks students were consuming at each sitting, the findings were even more startling.

"Nearly 60 per cent of students who have consumed alcohol in the past year in (grades 11 and 12) are drinking at least five alcoholic beverages on a typical day when they are drinking," said the study, published in November. "More than 10 per cent of (Grade 9 and 10) students and nearly 20 per cent of (Grade 11 and 12) students consume 10 drinks or more in a typical day of drinking."

In response to a series of incidents almost a decade ago in which young people died after consuming alcohol in city bars, the board of the Manitoba Liquor Control Commission led a push to change provincial regulations.

The changes brought mandatory training for bar servers and set a minimum price of $2.25 for alcoholic drinks. Bar personnel can no longer circulate among customers with trays of alcoholic drinks as promotions. The new regulations state servers can only carry drinks customers have actually ordered.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition January 15, 2009 A3