Planes, strains and automobiles

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This article was published 09/03/2018 (2776 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

PHILADELPHIA — Michael Hutchinson knew something was up when he checked his phone and saw he’d just missed a call from Manitoba Moose head coach Pascal Vincent.

“There was a text message to call him right away,” Hutchinson recalled Friday, recapping perhaps the wildest day of his pro hockey career.

The urgent plea from Vincent came at about 11:20 a.m. Thursday, as Hutchinson was making his way to the downtown rink in Milwaukee, Wis., where the Moose were set to practice at 12:30 p.m. Only there was about to be a major change of plans.

“You kinda do the math in your head and figure out that the Jets just finished morning skate so something was probably up,” Hutchinson said.

It certainly was. Goalie Steve Mason had abruptly left the morning skate in Newark, N.J., suffering from what the team has called a lower-body injury.

There was no way Mason was going to be able to dress as Connor Hellebuyck’s backup 6 1/2 hours later when the Jets faced off against the Devils. So the bat signal was sent out to Hutchinson, who was already racing against the clock considering the Jets were an hour ahead of him on the East Coast.

“So I had to get a car service from Milwaukee to Chicago (located about 150 kilometres away). That was a rush. The driver there did a great job getting me to Chicago in time, because I had a 2:30 p.m. (CT) flight,” said Hutchinson. “I had to rush through security and barely made it on the plane. That was a little bit hectic.”

The day would get even more chaotic for Hellebuyck and the Jets, as his flight departure was delayed.

“What they thought was going to be a 10-minute delay ended up being closer to an hour. You’re just kind of sitting there, and by that time you’ve just come to grips with it that it’s out of your control and try to relax and just sit there,” he said.

After finally taking off at about 3:30 p.m. — 150 minutes before the puck was set to drop in New Jersey — Hutchinson said he caught a “nice nap” during the approximately two-hour flight, only to hit yet another obstacle.

“To make matters worse, as soon as we landed (in Newark) there was a plane at our gate. So were delayed about another 30 minutes,” he said. Then there was an even further wait for his goalie equipment to get through to the baggage claim area.

“When I was sitting on the plane I thought I might not get there until the third period,” he said. “It felt like an eternity.”

Meanwhile, the Jets had to scramble to get another body ready in time for the pre-game warmup and the opening faceoff. Enter Zane Kalemba, a 32-year-old New Jersey native who had been out of pro hockey for two years. The highest level he played was in the East Coast Hockey League following an amateur career that included a season with the Flin Flon Bombers and four years back on his home turf at Princeton University.

Kalemba is listed as one of the emergency goaltenders in the area; all NHL teams must have a list to deal with such situations.

“Hang in there, brother,” was Jets coach Paul Maurice’s response when asked if he gave Kalemba a pre-game pep talk.

Turns out Kalemba had a familiar face in the room; he played with captain Blake Wheeler on the Green Bay Gamblers when they were juniors in the United States Hockey League in 2004-05. And Hutchinson also knew him as well — it turns out they were briefly teammates eight years ago on the Reading Royals of the ECHL. Hutchinson was in his first year of pro, while Kalemba had just finished up his collegiate career and joined the team late in the season.

“It was kind of cool seeing him in the hall. It was nice to see him, but I didn’t get much time to catch up with him as I was kind of in a rush. The hockey world is small, and the goalie world is even smaller,” said Hutchinson.

The Jets had a car waiting at the Newark airport to rush Hutchinson to the Prudential Center. He arrived during the first intermission and was dressed and ready for the start of the second period.

“I think I made pretty good time, all things considered,” said Hutchinson.

Oh, the glamorous life of a backup goalie. Hutchinson will remain with the Jets for the foreseeable future, as the extent of Mason’s injury is still unclear.

“We don’t think it’s significant right now. It doesn’t feel right to him. So we’re going to get as many tests as we need to to get it cleared up. My information now is this isn’t overly significant, it’s a few days,” Maurice said Friday.

The undisclosed injury was something that apparently began to bother Mason two nights earlier as he shut out the New York Rangers 3-0 at Madison Square Garden in his first game back in an NHL crease since suffering his second concussion of the season two months earlier.

“He finished the game. He started to feel a little off. And it’s not a concussion. It’s lower-body,” Maurice said.

Hutchinson is expected to get a start with the Jets, either Monday in Washington or Tuesday in Nashville, according to the coach. By then, he’ll have had a chance to catch his breath.

mike.mcintyre@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @mikemcintyrewpg