from Lewie Krashinsky of Sportsnet,

Organized by Dominic Moore, Smashfest is a charity ping-pong tournament created to raise funds for concussion research. Numerous players, including Martin St. Louis, Phil Kessel, David Clarkson and Kevin Westgarth, attended the second annual event Thursday.

“Great to see (Bettman) supporting a great charity event at Smashfest. Maybe we can get a dunk tank or something and make a little more money off of it,” quipped Westgarth, a tough Hurricanes winger who was heavily involved in the labour negotiations. “We want to bridge the gaps in our relationship, and hopefully (Bettman’s support for concussion research) can go a long way to doing that.”

The physical nature of hockey will naturally lead to concussions, Westgarth conceded, but that frequency and severity of head injuries is something worth trying to reduce.

“It’s an incredibly important topic to our membership in the PA. We’re going to do everything we can to make sure concussions are as small an issue as possible and that guys get treated properly and have long lives after their very short careers.”

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