Blind hockey goalie plays first league game in Edmonton
Nelson Rego is a rec league goaltender in Edmonton — and he's also blind.
Rego lost his sight in 2001 Specialists expected the decline to be gradual. But one morning, shortly after his diagnosis, he woke up and his sight was gone.
“It was a difficult moment,” he recalled.
While it took a few years to adjust, Rego said it never held him back from pursuing his goals.
“I’ve got a beautiful wife and child so I can’t say that I would take that all back because I wouldn’t have what I have now if I didn’t go through that circumstance,” he said.
John Hunter, a rec hockey player in Edmonton, met Rego online when he reached out to inquire about gear modifications and a chest protector.
A few weeks later, Hunter said he was injured before one of their games and put out a call on Facebook for a substitute goalie. He got no bites, at first…
“Nelson calls me, and he kind of starts out with, ‘Hey, how's the chest protector going? By the way, I’m not sure if this is a good idea or not but I saw your post for a goalie sub for your league game tonight. What do you think about me playing?’”
Hunter ran the idea past the team and everyone was “all in” on giving Rego a shot.
“He could be the first blind goalie anywhere to play a league game,” he said. “For sure here in Edmonton nobody 100 per cent blind has ever played a league game.”
“We didn’t tell the refs until puck drop,” he laughed.
Nelson Rego, a blind goalie for the Edmonton SeeHawks.
'I THINK HE'S JUST GOT SPIDEY SENSES'
To ensure he’s centred in the net he’ll tap his stick on the right side and his glove off the left, he explained.
“As long as I don’t drift far from the net, then I know where I’m at.”
According to Rego, his hearing is “tuned” and that’s how he gauges his play strategy.
“The subtle cues that people with their vision see, I pick up on those subtle cues with my hearing.”
“I think he’s just got spidey senses,” Hunter smiled. “The rest of it is all the hockey gods speaking to him.”
The game came down to one goal, 9-8, and according to Hunter, Rego held his own throughout the night.
“I came to watch obviously. I am screaming left, right, butterfly, centre.”
“He played just like any other normal person would in a league game,” he said.
“They made no accommodations for me,” Rego added. “It was just like being one of the guys on the team and that whole comradery thing that you get with a team that’s the thing that I really love the most.”
Rego said playing in that game was a huge moment for him as it brought awareness to blind hockey.
“Anything you set your mind to regardless of the obstacles, it can be done.”
With files from CTV news Edmonton’s Dave Mitchell
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Doctors say capital gains tax changes will jeopardize their retirement. Is that true?
The Canadian Medical Association asserts the Liberals' proposed changes to capital gains taxation will put doctors' retirement savings in jeopardy, but some financial experts insist incorporated professionals are not as doomed as they say they are.
Something in the water? Canadian family latest to spot elusive 'Loch Ness Monster'
For centuries, people have wondered what, if anything, might be lurking beneath the surface of Loch Ness in Scotland. When Canadian couple Parry Malm and Shannon Wiseman visited the Scottish highlands earlier this month with their two children, they didn’t expect to become part of the mystery.
Fair in Ontario, flurries in Labrador: Weather systems make for an erratic spring
It's no secret that spring can be a tumultuous time for Canadian weather, and as an unseasonably mild El Nino winter gives way to summer, there's bound to be a few swings in temperature that seem out of the ordinary. From Ontario to the Atlantic, though, this week is about to feel a little erratic.
What a urologist wants you to know about male infertility
When opposite sex couples are trying and failing to get pregnant, the attention often focuses on the woman. That’s not always the case.
He replaced Mickey Mantle. Now baseball's oldest living major leaguer is turning 100
The oldest living former major leaguer, Art Schallock turns 100 on Thursday and is being celebrated in the Bay Area and beyond as the milestone approaches.
'It was instant karma': Viral video captures failed theft attempt in Nanaimo, B.C.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
Bank of Canada officials split on when to start cutting interest rates
Members of the Bank of Canada's governing council were split on how long the central bank should wait before it starts cutting interest rates when they met earlier this month.
Quebec nurse had to clean up after husband's death in Montreal hospital
On a night she should have been mourning, a nurse from Quebec's Laurentians region says she was forced to clean up her husband after he died at a hospital in Montreal.
Northern Ont. lawyer who abandoned clients in child protection cases disbarred
A North Bay, Ont., lawyer who abandoned 15 clients – many of them child protection cases – has lost his licence to practise law.