Kukla's Korner Hockey

Kukla's Korner Hockey

Former Linesman Pat Dapuzzo Still In The Game

05/24/2020 at 8:20am EDT

from Kreistina Rutherford of Sportsnet,

Dapuzzo’s days as an NHL linesman are now more than a decade behind him. His career came to an abrupt and horrific end on a Saturday night in Philadelphia in 2008, when he suffered one of the most gruesome injuries in NHL history. But you wouldn’t know it by looking at him today: His brown hair hides a road map of scars, and feats of remarkable plastic surgery have reassembled parts of his face. In the booth, Dapuzzo brings a butter knife up to his forehead to point out the inch-long crevasse that appears between his eyebrows when he furrows his brow. The scar is the same width as a skate blade. It’s the only visible indicator of the moment that changed his life.

Dapuzzo hasn’t skated since he was guided off the ice 12 years ago. He says he’ll never skate again. But his is not a story defined by suffering or resentment, even if hockey did make him wonder whether he’d ever be happy again. This affable father of three has reinvented and rediscovered himself, and he’s enjoying yet another act in the game he fell in love with as a teenager.

To count the number of hockey careers the 61-year-old has influenced along the way is impossible. Boston Bruins defenceman Charlie McAvoy’s is one, and he says Dapuzzo “gave me a chance to follow my dream.” NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly has been a friend of Dapuzzo’s for more than 20 years. “To see what he’s overcome, what he’s accomplished and what he’s doing today, I couldn’t be more proud,” Daly says. Dapuzzo is no longer sharing the ice with the greats and he may be as far from hockey’s spotlight as ever, but the man friends call “Dap” is in the midst of his most important and selfless work in the game yet. “He’s put his whole life into it,” McAvoy says.

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About Kukla's Korner Hockey

Paul Kukla founded Kukla’s Korner in 2005 and the site has since become the must-read site on the ‘net for all the latest happenings around the NHL.

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