Looking frightful, feeling delightful

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This article was published 20/04/2023 (872 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

LAS VEGAS — Morgan Barron is feeling a lot better than he looks, which, given the state of his mangled face right now, is a very good thing.

“Some guys look at me like I’m a science project,” the 24-year-old Winnipeg Jets forward joked Thursday morning at T-Mobile Arena.

Despite his ghastly appearance, Barron was good to go for Game 2 of his team’s playoff series against the Vegas Golden Knights. He’s going to be wearing a full cage for the foreseeable future, which is protecting the battered and bruised area around his right eye currently being held together by approximately 75 stitches.

“Guys are awesome about it and feel like we may still make light of it. Obviously, it was pretty fortunate the way things ended up,” Barron said.

Game 1 was everything Barron could have hoped for from a team perspective, with the Jets skating away with a convincing 5-1 victory over the Golden Knights, but it was a nightmare on a personal level, with Barron falling face first onto the exposed skate blade of Vegas goaltender Laurent Brossoit during a scramble around the net.

“Too many times to count, yes,” Barron said when asked if he’s seen the replay.

“I didn’t want to panic because I figured jerking my head around would maybe make it worse. I think I might have pushed it down with my glove, but I don’t know, maybe a second? Honestly, coming off, you don’t really feel. I had no idea how deep it was or anything. I just thought it was a little nick. Once you get in there, their reactions are what I based it off of.”

The video, and the aftermath, have created a buzz around the hockey world and beyond. Heck, even People magazine did a story on him, although they spelled his name wrong (Barrond) and referred to his injury happening in the “first quarter” of the game.

Naturally, his phone has blown up in the past two days.

“One-hundred, 200, somewhere in there,” Barron said of the number of text messages. “People are really good, just supportive and the overwhelming sentiment was just you know, I’m really grateful for the community I’ve kind of built around me and that includes obviously my teammates and coaches, former teammates and fans, and obviously my family, so I’m really grateful for all that.”

Barron contacted his parents in Nova Scotia, along with his girlfriend, as he sat in a chair getting sewn up on Tuesday. He missed about a period of action, or less than an hour of real time.

“(Mom) was really grateful that I was OK, obviously, but she’s a nurse so she’s had all sorts of advice for me and has been checking up,” he said.

“I think she’s still a little bit worried but, like I said, I’m really fortunate the way things ended up and we have top-notch care in the other room so I’m really grateful for all of the docs and trainers and everybody helping.”

Barron was also thankful for Vegas forward Chandler Stephenson, who actually pulled his head off of Brossoit’s skate once he realized what had occurred. It may have saved him from further damage.

“I will give him a little tap on the shin pads (Thursday night) to thank him. You know, it is obviously a really classy move, especially in the thick of things, it’s obviously intense out there, but I really appreciated his effort and he just helped me out a little bit,” he said.

Barron is likely to be sporting a permanent souvenir out of this playoff series, perhaps for the rest of his life.

“Scar cream and red light, I’ve been told, are helpful but I imagine it’s going to be there forev… a little while,” he said.

Jets head coach Rick Bowness has seen a lot of things over his 40-year career both on the ice and behind the bench. He said Thursday that Barron’s toughness in returning to finish the game, and now gutting through this injury, ranks near the top.

“We talked about that with the group (Thursday) morning. You talk about all in, man, that’s all in,” said Bowness.

“When you’re laying there for that long to get stitched up like that, and you come back out with a cage on, and you don’t even hesitate to get back on the ice and you don’t even hesitate to run over somebody — which he did — in the corner on his first shift.

“We showed a clip of him when he played in Cornell, they wore those cages in college. He’s used to the cage, but I don’t think anybody is used to playing with the cut he received the other night. Athletes take a lot of pride in their ability to overcome injury — hockey players are really good at that.”

Bowness also hails from Nova Scotia and Barron was one of the first players he met after taking the Winnipeg job last summer. The pair actually had a golf day in Halifax.

Bowness admitted seeing the young man get hurt sent a jolt.

“I had a talk with him. ‘Are you sure you’re OK?’ I’m not throwing him out there if there was any hesitancy at all. He said, ‘Nope. I’m ready. I’m fine. I can see.’ And he wanted to go,” said Bowness.

Bowness said the warrior mentality of someone like Barron, and the human element displayed by Stephenson during the heat of battle, represent the best part of sport.

“I love seeing that stuff,” he said. “We’re out there to win, we’re out there to compete, we’re out there to battle each other and we’re out there to make life miserable for each other, but there comes a point when one of your peers is seriously hurt and it looks bad, then you gotta help them. I give him full marks for that.”

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @mikemcintyrewpg