David Backes speaks for the first time since the emotional Scott Sabourin incident.

Backes opens up about his emotional moment earlier this season.

HockeyFeed
HockeyFeed
Published 4 years ago
David Backes speaks for the first time since the emotional Scott Sabourin incident.

If you were not a fan of Boston Bruins veteran forward David Backes prior to the start of the 2019 - 2020 National Hockey League regular season then I have to imagine that this has been a pretty eye opening experience for you. Backes, perhaps more than any other high profile athlete in the NHL has done before, revealed a side of himself that truly laid bare just what a genuinely good man he is underneath that helmet and jersey. 

Backes of course was involved in the now infamous Scott Sabourin incident, an incident that left both players out for several weeks as a result of the injuries they sustained on that day. For those of you who have somehow missed it, the two men collided on what should have been a routine hit but the impact of their bodies against one another caused their heads to whiplash into one another at a high speed, leaving both men with significant head injuries. 


Although Sabourin got the worst of it from the physical end of things, it was clear that Backes was genuinely disturbed by what he had seen happen to a fellow NHL player. Backes' reaction to the entire thing earned him the love and praise of fans from all around the NHL and spoke to the true gentleman that David Backes really is when things get real. 


Backes spoke to the media for the first time since the incident on Saturday and explained why the moment had proven to be so emotional for him. Backes says that he had the Roman Polak incident, an incident that saw Polak leaving on a stretcher earlier in the season, fresh in his mind and to see a player go through that right in front of him was simply overwhelming.

“To be part of a collision, and I saw (Sabourin) down there, and I saw blood coming from his mouth, his nose, his eye and he wasn’t moving … I’ve seen guys knocked out quite a few times and after 15 or 20 seconds they start to get the twitches or they wake up wondering where they are. It’s scary, but it seemed to me like he was out for minutes," said Backes as per the Ottawa Sun.

“I was really fearful that he was critically injured and he needed significant help. As he started moving, that (reaction) subsided a little bit, but my vision wasn’t great and I knew I was a little messed-up from the contact as well and I needed to go take care of myself as well.”

Backes admitted that he was not well aware of Scott Sabourin prior to that moment but would go on to learn that the gritty Senators forward has a fiancee and had parents who were watching that night. As a family man in his own right Backes had no trouble imagining what that ordeal could have been like for his family and their positions been reversed on the play. Once again however Backes demonstrated great class by admitting that he has kept Sabourin in his thoughts and prayers while going through his own recovery process this season.

“I still think about him and I pray for him when I think about what I’m going through and I would imagine he’s hopefully on a similar path to recovery and being back on the ice shortly,” Backes said.

I very much look forward to seeing both men on the ice once again, and no doubt the level of respect between the two will be at an all time high should they cross paths in the future.

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