TORONTO | Shea Weber misses hockey. Since his last match, on July 7, 2021, not a day goes by without him still imagining himself with the skates on his feet.
“What I miss the most is being with the guys, the camaraderie,” said the former captain of the Canadiens, who will be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on Monday evening. The struggles and the competition, both in training and in matches, cannot be found anywhere else.”
Nearly three and a half years have passed since the defender, kneeling on the ice at Amalie Arena, watched helplessly as the Tampa Bay Lightning players celebrated their second consecutive Stanley Cup.
Photo Martin Chevalier
Monday night, he will become a hockey immortal. A way of coming full circle for the man whose injuries forced him to retire after a career of 1,038 matches. The pride of the moment helps him heal his wound, but it is not yet completely healed. He’s still bruised.
“It gets easier as the years go by. But let’s say that the first one was particularly difficult. Because I was trying to come back,” he said, a few moments after receiving his Temple ring.
Unable to get out of bed
It was during this famous season, as part of a visit to Seattle in October, that Jonathan Drouin slipped away saying that Weber had retired. It appears that, at this time, the decision was not final. But the one that the Canadian had acquired in return for PK Subban had to face the facts.
“It was so painful,” he said. During the shortened season, the schedule was so condensed that I didn’t even know if I would be able to get through it,” said Weber, about the second campaign compromised by COVID-19.
“I couldn’t even get out of bed. I was fooled, he continued. The after-effects of all the operations I had undergone were coming back to the surface. I wanted to give myself one last chance, but it was getting worse and worse.”
Weber says that in the final miles of this campaign that surprisingly took the Canadiens to the Stanley Cup final, he was unable to take a flight of stairs without standing behind the rail and going down sideways.
Although Weber’s body was falling into tatters, he made sure that those around him didn’t really notice. Aside from the medical staff and the team and coaches, only his father and a few teammates knew about the captain’s miserable health condition.
The injury that changed everything
No, Shea Weber has not been spared from injuries during his career. But the one that marked the beginning of the end was the one he suffered while blocking a shot from Jack Eichel, at the time of the Buffalo Sabres, during the very first game of the 2017-2018 season.
“The shot hit me directly in the ankle. I went straight to the bench,” Weber said. I immediately thought I had a fracture, but the x-rays taken on site showed nothing conclusive. Perhaps I should have sought another opinion more quickly.”
Not only did he not make it, but he continued to play through that injury until mid-December. Two months during which he was absent for seven matches.
“I could have gone and sat on the bridge for a few weeks, it would have possibly stretched my career by a few seasons,” he said. But that’s not the way I play.”
“As long as I’m not a nuisance to the team, I always want to be there for them no matter the pain level. This is the type of leader I always wanted to be,” he continued.
Today, even though his legs still hurt, he has no regrets.
“I am so grateful for what hockey has given me,” he said. I played every match like it was my last. I’m proud to have left everything on ice.”
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