ASU hockey players dispute review of Matthew Mayich collapse, seek coaching changes
Seven players anonymously reported that heat safety rules were ignored during the workout and want coaches replaced while an independent investigation examines the collapse.
Watch: ASU hockey players come forward disputing claims in Matthew Mayich tragedy | 14 mins
Seven members of Arizona State University’s men’s hockey team told the school’s president that safety policies were ignored during an outdoor workout in which a teammate collapsed from heat illness.
The 26-page report, submitted anonymously through Phoenix attorney Tim Casey, disputes an internal review released a week earlier by Senior Vice President James Rund.
The players are calling for the coaching staff to be replaced while an independent investigation takes place.
In an interview with KTAR News 92.3 FM’s Outspoken with Bruce & Gaydos, Casey said the players witnessed the Aug. 20 workout and personally attested to the accuracy of their accounts.
“They wanted to make sure that the truth got out there because they have not seen the truth come out,” Casey said.
The full report can be read here.
“We are submitting this report anonymously because we fear retaliation from the coaching staff,” the players wrote. “The head coach and his assistant coaches were all on the field on Aug. 20, all remain in their positions and together they decide our playing time, scholarship levels and roster status.”
What ASU hockey players say happened before Matthew Mayich collapsed
Matthew Mayich collapsed Aug. 20 during a workout at Sun Angel Stadium in Tempe led by outside instructor Tim Ziesel.
The players say the session lasted more than 75 minutes, not 45 as the Rund report found.
They say water breaks were brief and Mayich did not get water during the second opportunity.
“These were not dedicated water breaks,” Casey said. “These were very spur of the moment things where the people who finished early might get a little bit of water.”
The players say Ziesel left before the final drill, when Mayich fell.
They also say no cold-water immersion tub or ice was on the field, as ASU’s heat policy requires.
“We also have other players that survived everything, but who got down on a knee,” he said. “You know, they were vomiting. No one intervened.”
An attorney for the Mayich family, Robert Carey, told KTAR News 92.3 FM that much of what the players describe was new to the family and “far worse than we knew.”
“The university has accepted falsehoods about conduct that put a young man on life support, and that is inexcusable,” he said in a statement.
Carey said coach Greg Powers and Ziesel had described a short, easy session with water available, and that the Rund report adopted that account.
He called on President Michael Crow to order an outside investigation “without further delay.”
The players asked Crow to act before the team’s Oct. 2 season opener.
According to the players’ letter, no one involved has been disciplined.
Mayich remains in stable, but critical condition, according to Carey.
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Comments
3 Comments
Guess they didn't close the circle, because some of the horses are getting out.
Kudos to those kids who had the stones to step up and start exposing what really happened out there.
If you're in a program where you fear retaliation by the university for discovery of facts, or your scholarship and roster status can be jeopardized by telling the truth, you would do well by transferring to another program.
If ASU has been circling the wagons around the coaching staff, this latest just might cause all those wagons to disappear.