Author: greggdrinnan

Kamloops wife/mother of three needs kidney . . . Husband starts GoFundMe page

JulieDodds
Julie Dodds is in need of a kidney transplant. Are you able to help?

 

More than a year has come and gone since I wrote about Julie Dodds, a mother of three young boys and a Kamloops resident.

She had just revealed that she has a genetic kidney disease — Medullary Kidney Disease Type 1 — and had reached Stage 4. That is the last stage before a person enters kidney failure.

At that time, she wrote: “My kidneys are failing and I need a LIVING KIDNEY DONOR to have the best chance at life.

“I understand that this is a huge request, but for myself, for my husband, who wants nothing other than to be able to save me from all of this, for my three boys, who still need their mom to be present and healthy in their lives, it would mean absolutely everything.”

She also added this:

“WILL YOU HELP?

  • Any healthy adult can donate one of their kidneys — and, thanks to paired kidney exchange, you don’t have to be a blood-type match to the recipient!
  • You only need one kidney to live a healthy, long life.
  • Most donor surgery is done laparoscopically, meaning through tiny incisions.
  • The recuperation period is usually fairly quick, generally two weeks after 1-2 days in hospital.
  • The donor will have a separate team of healthcare professionals to evaluate her/him as a living donor. Their job is to help you understand the risks and benefits and look out for YOUR best interests.”

——

One of the important numbers to those with kidney disease is the glomerular filtration rate (GFR), something that is found via a blood test. According to the National Kidney Foundation, if your GFR is between 29 and 15, you are in Stage 4. If it slips below that, you are in kidney failure and closing in on dialysis, either peritoneal or hemo.

Today, that is where Julie finds herself.

Allan, Julie’s husband, now has started a GoFundMe page on which he reports that Julie’s GFR is at 13. “Over time,” he writes, “her kidney disease has gotten worse, causing her kidneys not to work well enough to keep her alive. . . . With such a lower function, Julie continues to try and be Super Mom/friend, but energy levels are now a struggle to keep up to her level of Mom-hood.”

In a perfect world, a kidney from a live donor will be found for her before she has to go on dialysis.

In the meantime, that GoFundMe page is right here. Included is a look at the various expenses that Allan is hoping to be able to cover via donations to the page.

——

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

——

Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604-875-5182 or 1-855-875-5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

——

Or, for more information, visit right here.

 

Ex-WHLer advocating for improved semi driver training. Again . . . NHL teams jump on NBA train . . . Two teams opt out of junior B league

Once again, Scott Thomas is calling for change in the training of big rig drivers in Canada. Thomas, a former WHL player, has been down this road before, shortly after his son, Evan, died in the crash of the Humboldt Broncos’ bus on April 6, 2018, a tragedy that resulted in charges against a semi driver. Afterwards, Scott advocated for more stringent driver trainer. . . . These days, Scott is calling for change after a friend, Jeff Helperl, was involved in an accident in a construction zone near Wakaw, Sask., on Tuesday. . . . In that one, a semi rear-ended one vehicle and that resulted in a five-vehicle mess, the death of a 69-year-old man and other injuries. . . . The semi driver has been charged with dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing death, and dangerous operation of a motor vehicle causing bodily harm. . . . “Our truck drivers should be a skilled trade,” Thomas told Laura Woodward of CTV News. “They should be like plumbers, electricians, chefs. You go through a co-op program, apprenticeship and you work your way through a graduated licencing program before you’re in charge of an 18-wheeler.” . . . That story is right here.

The NHL’s players, at least those on the eight teams still involved in playoffs, jumped on board the NBA train on Thursday, meaning four games were postponed.

By postponing four games — two were to have been played Thursday and two more today — it allowed all eight of the surviving teams to participate in the protest.

With the NHL, NBA and WNBA postponing all of their games, and with NFL teams scrubbing practices and MLB moving some games, you now have to wonder: What’s next?

Do the leagues simply return to play and everybody moves on, or is it different this time? Have we witness the tipping point?

You will recall that there was a hue and cry following after the death of George Floyd, a Black man, at the hands of policeman in Minneapolis on May 25.

The athletes’ protests this week stem from the shooting of Jacob Blake, who is Black, by a white policeman in Kenosha, Wis., on Sunday.

As I wonder what comes next, I read an interesting story in the San Francisco Chronicle in which Harry Edwards, a prominent sociologist who is highly respect and happens to be Black, suggested to Ron Kroichick that perhaps leagues/teams could refuse to play in Wisconsin.

“If the stars of the Bucks,” Edwards told Kroichick, “or LeBron James and Steph Curry — if athletes of this magnitude show up at the attorney general’s office in Wisconsin and say, ‘We made it here this time, but we may not make it back to the airport, because we could be stopped and shot. So what we’re asking, what we’re demanding, is change. We’re saying, Stop killing us.’

“If you have that kind of star power, with (NBA Commissioner) Adam Silver and the owners and the rest of the players behind them . . . Even if it comes down to saying, ‘We’re not playing any more games in Wisconsin.’ If they went in there right after breakfast, they’d have action by lunchtime.”

Of course, were that to happen in Wisconsin, there would then have to be a move to another state and another and on and on.

In reality, who knows what the next move will be. It’s just that this time things feel different. When something like this happens and it results in hockey players — Black and White — standing elbow to elbow and singing the same song it signals that something is different.

COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .

A sign of the times? Jayden Castle has organized a GoFundMe page in the hopes of helping him meet the cost of playing hockey for his junior B team in 2020-21. The intro the site reads: “Because of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic my hockey team has increased its fee to play to $10,000 and with a minimum wage it’s just not gonna cut it!” . . . A 20-year-old from Abbotsford, B.C., Castle plays for the junior B Kamloops Storm of the Kootenay International Junior Hockey League. . . .

Sources have told Taking Note that the 20-team junior B Kootenay International Junior Hockey League won’t start on Oct. 2 as it had hoped, and now is aiming for Nov. 13. It also won’t have the same 20 teams which it had last season; in fact, it now is down to 18 with the possibility of more franchises opting to sit out. . . . With the U.S.-Canada border closed for the foreseeable future, the Spokane Braves will take the season off and, in fact, informed their players of the decision on Thursday. The Braves are the KIJHL’s lone American entry. . . . The 100 Mile House Wranglers also are expected to take their leave, at least for one season. . . . There are believed to be other franchises pondering their immediate futures, too. They will have to decide before the KIJHL makes a number of announcements next week. . . .

Sahadev Sharma and Patrick Mooney of The Athletic reported that multiple sources have told them the Chicago Cubs are “slashing their scouting and player development staff . . . (including) scouts on the amateur and professional sides as well as double-digit staffers in player development, according to early estimates.” . . . One week earlier, The Athletic’s Lindsey Adler reported that the New York Yankees began “a wave of layoffs and furloughs” that impacted minor-league coaches and support staff. . . . The Cubs and Yankees aren’t the first MLB teams to do go this route. The Arizona Diamondbacks, Los Angeles Angels, Oakland Athletics, Texas Rangers and Washington Nationals also have furloughed employees. . . .

The NHL reported earlier in the week that its teams had spent another week in their bubbles without any positive tests. . . . Thomas Drance of The Athletic tweeted Wednesday that “it’s taken nearly 25,000 tests and cost nearly $8 million, but the NHL hasn’t had a positive COVID-19 test in almost five weeks. In 2020, that feels like a miracle.” . . .

The 62-team North American Hockey Classic, a minor hockey tournament that was to have been held in Winnipeg this weekend, has been cancelled. Kelly Moore of Global News reported that 61 of the 62 teams were from Manitoba, with the other from Kenora, Ont. The tournament was to be for girls and boys ages seven to 13. . . . Rhys Van Kemenade, the NAHC’s general manager, said in a news release that the decision to cancel was made because of a recent rise in Covid-19 cases in Manitoba that coincide with the impending return to school. . . . The NAHC is owned by 50 Below Sports+Entertainment, which also owns the WHL’s Winnipeg Ice and the MJHL’s Manitoba Blues. . . .

The NFL’s Philadelphia Eagles have said there won’t be any fans allowed to attend games at Lincoln Financial Field until further notice. . . . The Eagles are scheduled to open at Washington on Sept. 13, where there won’t be fans at any home games in 2020. . . . Philadelphia is to play at home on Sept. 20 and 27.

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

——

Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604-875-5182 or 1-855-875-5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

——

Or, for more information, visit right here.

Why does Sam Mitchell drive with his wallet on the dash?

It was Wednesday afternoon.

The Orlando Magic was on the court prior to what was to have been an NBA playoff game.

The Milwaukee Bucks, who were to have provided the opposition, remained in their locker room in the Orlando bubble.

As we now know, the Bucks were deciding whether to play and, in the end, the players chose to boycott, their reaction to the police shooting of Jacob Blake, who took seven bullets in the back in Kenosha, Wisc., which is 40 miles south of Milwaukee on I-94.

Meanwhile, ESPN, which was to have televised the game, was filling time with speculation and stories while awaiting final word. Would there be a game or not?

And there was Sam Mitchell, a Black American who used to be the head coach of the Toronto Raptors. These days, he shows up as an analyst on TSN, NBA-TV, NBA Radio on SiriusXM and, on this afternoon, ESPN.

As I listened, Mitchell, with a chuckle, told how he is of an age — he’s soon to turn 57 — where he still carries his wallet in a hip pocket.

But when he gets in his car, he said, he takes the wallet out of his pocket and puts it on the dash. Because, he explained, if he were to be pulled over by police, he wouldn’t want to have to do any reaching. Why not? Because he never wants to do anything that would give a policeman an excuse to shoot him.

Seriously!

For whatever reason, what Mitchell had to say just blew me away.

I’m on social media. I subscribe to three big city American newspapers. I hear, see and read the stories. I guess I just had never had it explained to me in this fashion.

Maybe it’s because I get in our vehicle, turn the key and drive somewhere almost every day without ever giving a second thought to where my wallet is in that vehicle. (For the record, it’s in my right hip pocket.) But the more I thought about it the more what I had heard from Mitchell really hit home.

And that’s why I wasn’t the least bit surprised to arrive home later in the afternoon — yes, I got in our vehicle, wallet in pocket, and drove away — to find out that three NBA games were postponed, and that WNBA players also had shut it down, dropping three games. Three MLB games, including one involving the Milwaukee Brewers, didn’t take place, nor did five MLS games.

(During a meeting of teams Wednesday night in Orlando, the Los Angeles Clippers and Los Angeles Lakers are said to have voted to end the season. Other teams apparently didn’t follow suit. The NBA has called an emergency meeting of its board of governors for this morning.)

Naomi Osaka, the Japanese tennis player, pulled out of a semifinal match at the Western & Southern Open in New York City, saying, “Watching the genocide of Black people at the hand of police is honestly making me sick to my stomach.” (Later, the tournament announced that it wouldn’t hold any matches today as it takes “a stance against racial inequality and social injustice that once again has been thrust to the forefront in the United States.”)

NHL players, of course, didn’t miss a beat. The Boston Bruins, Colorado Avalanche, Dallas Stars and Tampa Bay Lightning went ahead with their playoff games in the Toronto and Edmonton bubbles. The NHL spent 27 seconds acknowledging Blake prior to the game in Toronto. There was nothing in Edmonton. Not a peep.

What? You expected the NHL or its players, the vast majority of whom are white, to show awareness of something going on outside their bubbles. They showed little of that a short time ago when the likes of Evander Kane and Matt Dumba, both of whom are Black players, started Hockey is Diversity. That followed the death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis policemen on May 25.

On Wednesday evening, before the games began, former NHL G Kelly Hrudey, now an analyst with Sportsnet, offered: “I’m disappointed that we’re talking about hockey tonight. I don’t think we should be here. I think the NHL should postpone the games.”

But when the first intermission arrived, Hrudey was sitting there . . . talking hockey.

Over on TNT, analyst Kenny (The Jet) Smith walked away from the NBA set.

“As a Black man, as a former player, I think it’s best for me to support the players and not be here tonight,” Smith said as he walked away.

Meanwhile, I watched the last few minutes of the first period of the Boston-Tampa Bay NHL game and the first intermission. When the Sportsnet panel all but ignored what was going outside its bubble, I turned off the TV.

I’m not saying I’m done with the NHL for any specific length of time, but for now I can’t watch. I won’t watch. I am embarrassed — but not surprised — that NHL players showed the world exactly how tone deaf they are.

Of course, hockey players, for the most part, learn pretty much from the get-go not to swim against the current. These days, however, some of them might want to check to see if the current is changing direction.

——

If you are on Twitter, check out the thread posted by Kishaun Gervais of the Portland Winterhawks on Wednesday night, part of which is right here:

https://twitter.com/KGervais16/status/1298837819209601029?s=20

OHL teams look to bring U.S. teams north . . . B.C.’s top doc says “many more months of this to come” . . . NAHL team out for season

If you are a junior hockey fan living in Western Canada or the Pacific Northwest, there hasn’t been much to cheer about the past few days. The COVID-19 numbers haven’t been good. And with summer’s last long weekend around the corner and schools soon to open in Canada, I really wonder what is in our immediate future. . . . On Monday, in releasing the latest statistics for B.C., Dr. Bonnie Henry, the province’s top medical official, offered this ominous note: “There are many more months of this to come.” . . . She also said: “What we need to do is figure out how to do all that we want to do in our society safely for the next year, maybe longer.” . . . The maximum number of people allowed at indoor gatherings in B.C. these days is 50 and, Dr. Henry said, there is “no opportunity” to change that in the near future.

Adam Wodon, the managing editor at collegehockeynews.com, addressed a few things in a piece he posted on Tuesday. This column really resonated because it deals with those folks who get upset when people like him report things that point out it is going to be difficult to get hockey in at some levels in 2020. . . . “I pointed out the delusion of thinking the sports-minded ‘go get ‘em’ mentality was going to get us through this,” he writes. “These remarks have been interpreted wrong in a variety of ways, which is frustrating, to say the least. I’ve heard three main negative critiques, all of which are preposterous, frankly.” . . . He addresses those right here as he hammers the nail on the head.

Interestingly, The Daily Tar Heel, the student newspaper at the U of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, has decided that it no longer will use the term “student athlete,” opting instead for “college athlete,” “athlete” or “student.” . . . The newspaper’s reasoning is in an editorial that is right here. . . . Gotta wonder if major junior hockey pooh-bahs might ever consider doing the same. Nah, never mind.

COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .

The Corpus Christi IceRays announced Monday that they are suspending operations for the 2020-21 NAHL season. . . . From a team-issued statement: “After much consideration surrounding the developments of COVID-19, and for the health and safety of our organizational family, which includes our players, our coaches, our operating and arena staff, our billet families, and the fans that make up the Greater Corpus Christi and Coastal Bend communities, we have made the difficult decision to suspend operations for the upcoming 2020-21 season and return or the 2021-22 season.” . . .

Retired track star Usain Bolt has tested positive and is in self-isolation, albeit asymptomatic, in his Jamaican home. Bolt, 34, may have contracted the virus at his recent 34th birthday party. . . . The Jamaican government has limited gatherings to 20 people, and Andrew Holness,the country’s prime minister, has said Bolt won’t be given any special treatment, so there could be discipline of some sort involved once an investigation is completed. . . . Two international soccer players — Raheem Sterling of Manchester City and Leon Bailey of Bayer Leverkusen — also were in attendance at the birthday party. . . .

The NFL’s San Francisco 49ers are scheduled to open the regular season on Sept. 13 and they will do it in front of empty seats at Levi’s Stadium. Chances are good that fans won’t be allowed at any of their next three home games, either — Oct. 4, Oct. 11 and Oct. 18. At the moment, the Santa Clara County public health department is limiting outdoor gatherings to 60 people. . . . Meanwhile, the Las Vegas Raiders have said they won’t have fans at home games all season, and the Los Angeles Chargers and Los Angeles Rams, both of whom play at SoFi Stadium, said they won’t have spectators “until further notice.” . . . The Buffalo Bills say they won’t have fans in attendance at their first two home games, on Sept. 13 and Sept. 27. . . . When the Bills open on the road against Miami on Sept. 20, the Dolphins say they will allow in 13,000 fans, all of whom must wear masks while in the stadium. . . .

The Rural Manitoba Football League suspended its 2020 season on Tuesday “with an eye toward playing our competitive season in the spring of 2021,” it said in a news release. . . .

The U of Alabama has reported 531 positives on its Tuscaloosa campus, along with another 35 on campuses in Birmingham and Huntsville. Those come after six days of classes. . . . There are countless reports of American universities suspending students for reckless behaviour at off-campus parties and a lack of social distancing, including 23 by Syracuse U, 36 by Purdue U, more than 200 at Ohio State, 11 at Montclair State and on it goes.

Congress

——

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

——

Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604-875-5182 or 1-855-875-5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

——

Or, for more information, visit right here.

Sask

Here’s Jack Finarelli, aka The Sports Curmudgeon, with his Thought for the Day, this one from Dwight Eisenhower, a former U.S. president: “Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil and you’re a thousand miles from a corn field.”

The 52-team Provincial Junior Hockey League, a junior C circuit in Ontario, hopes to begin a regular-season schedule on Dec. 1 that will have teams playing at least 24 games. Of course, that is contingent on approval from all of the appropriate health and hockey officials.

Jamie Russell, a native of Kamloops, is the new director of hockey operations and head coach of the 18U team at South Kent School, a private all-boys boarding school in South Kent, Conn. . . . Russell has extensive NCAA coaching experience with stops at Ferris State, Cornell, Michigan Tech and Providence College. He also was the director of hockey operations and head coach with the ECHL’s Elmira Jackals. . . . He spent three seasons (2016-19) as the general manager and head coach of the ECHL’s Worcester Railers. . . . There is a news release right here.

Dense

Living kidney donor: ‘So should you donate a kidney? You should at least consider it.’

Susan
On Sept. 22, 2017, Susan Duncan found herself on the front page of Kamloops This Week, along with Lloyd Garner to whom she had given a kidney.

Susan Duncan has been a friend for more than 20 years. She was the editor at the Kamloops Daily News who hired me as sports editor in 2000. I loved working for and with her because there weren’t any mind games, and she never held a grudge — at least, I don’t think she did. We had our disagreements — I can recall one shouting match in the middle of the newsroom — but when they were over they were over.

Susan left The Daily News for a positoin as Communications Officer with Interior Health in February 2011, no doubt using her female intuition to flee the sinking ship before many of us realized it was taking on water. But she was there when my wife, Dorothy, started doing peritoneal dialysis, and Susan always offered great support.

Little did I know at the time that Susan would end up as part of our kidney family. In 2017, organizers of the annual Kidney Walk in Kamloops selected her as the event’s honouree.

What follows arrived via email on Monday. It is Susan’s story . . . in her words.

I donated a kidney in July 2016. I generally avoid talking about it because people then tell me how brave I was and so on. It’s embarrassing and also a huge exaggeration of my decision.

As well, I worry about encouraging someone else to donate. I don’t want the burden of guilt I will feel if someone does decide to donate a kidney and then has an unhappy experience.

But as I read the appeals by my former colleague Gregg Drinnan on behalf of desperate people searching for live kidney donors, I feel a sense of responsibility to share what it means to be an organ donor.

I realize that the time has come for me to be brave. The chances of having a bad experience are slim and there are so many sick people who need others to step up.

So here is my story. I hope one or some of you will make it yours.

I donated my left kidney four years ago and I haven’t missed it since. There was no side effect from the surgery, my blood pressure has remained low and my kidney function is normal. One healthy kidney is all this old body ever needed and, various factors aside, it’s probably all yours needs, too.

It was a bit of a fluke that I ended up being a donor. I knew the man’s wife vaguely through work and that she and her husband had three young children. I met her one day in the elevator at work and she told me she was at the hospital because her husband was there for dialysis.

He got sick suddenly in February and a few months later he was spending four hours a day, three days a week in the renal unit at Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops. They also lived two hours out of town so you can imagine what that was doing to their family life.

She introduced me to him and I warmed immediately to his big friendly smile. We chatted briefly about his illness, then we said goodbye. As I walked away, he called out, “Hey, if you know anyone with A positive blood type . . .”

I looked back and said, “I’m A positive . . . maybe I should get tested.” That night I researched live kidney donation and discovered that a person only needs one healthy kidney to live a full life.

The paperwork began, followed by a myriad of tests, including psychological. It turns out it doesn’t take much to be a match for a kidney donation.

At age 59, tests showed that I, an atheist mother of three grown children and two stepchildren, was a match for a 50-year-old man of deep Christian faith and father of three small children.

I went into hospital on a Monday morning and was out of surgery by noon. My husband was barely on the ninth tee when he got the call that all went well.

My former kidney got a good flushing out and was put in her new home later that afternoon. I’m told — and I’m proud of this — that she started pumping out urine before the surgeons even finished sewing her in place.

I stayed two nights in a little room at St. Paul’s Hospital, just down the hall from my match. I left the hospital at noon on Wednesday, walking slowly and feeling very tired.

Spare no tears for me though. The heroes are the patients who get the kidneys — they endure far more. But in the end, they not only stay alive, they live joyously, unencumbered by dialysis machines either at home or in the hospital.

I spent two more days in Vancouver at relatives. I took a few Tramadol (pain killers). Friday morning, my husband and I drove home to Kamloops. On Saturday afternoon, we went to a beautiful outdoor wedding and reception.

I felt really poorly once about a week after my surgery. But by the next day, I felt great and never looked back. The second Monday after surgery, I returned to work. Granted, it’s a desk job, no physical labour required aside from typing into a keyboard. If I had any other kind of a job, I likely would have been off for a month.

I also was back running long distance by September with no change in my energy.

As for scars, if you look really closely, there are two tiny scars on my left side and about a three-inch line well below my navel. If I had my shape from the 1980s, I could easily wear a bikini and no one would be the wiser.

I would like to say it’s because I’m tough, but I’ve read stories by other people who have donated kidneys and my recovery does not appear unique.

So should you donate a kidney? You should at least consider it. If you are a person who spends a lot of time worrying about your health, even though you are healthy, you probably shouldn’t. You will fixate on potential problems and experience stress you don’t need.

But if you are a healthy person who has always had normal blood pressure and you want improve a fellow human being’s life — maybe even save it — the information about live donation is right at your fingertips.

When I do think about my left kidney, I get a warm feeling that I was able to help a family. It makes me smile at times when I am feeling low.

My match regularly sends me a text to thank me. He calls me his angel. His kids wrote letters of thanks. Those are lovely gestures and I am always happy to hear he is doing well.

However, If I had never heard from him again, if he never once said thank you, if he ended up being a person who abused his body because of the disease of addiction, it would not have made me regret my decision.

I gave him a kidney and that’s that. The kidney was his. The decision to donate was mine and I had no expectation or desire for gratitude.

Some people are not able to say thank you for reasons of their own. They don’t make contact and that leaves some donors angry or hurt and second-guessing their decision.

Don’t donate if you expect thanks. Do it because it’s the right thing to do. You have a vital organ that you don’t need and someone else does.

It’s common sense.

Scattershooting on a Sunday night while wondering if the Canucks can find that much game . . .

Scattershooting

On the evening of Aug. 10, I ordered two Pik Pockets — they are for a WaterPik — from walmart.ca. No, I wasn’t shopping local, but we hadn’t been able to find any . . . until we checked walmart.ca.

Early on the morning of Aug. 13, I got an email informing me that “items in your order are on the move.” The first hint that this was going to be a difficult delivery came when I noticed that the carrier was shown as “USPS.” Yes, that USPS; you know, the one with which Trump and Co. are tinkering.

No matter. The package was on the move. Right?

There is one of those Track Your Shipment buttons in that same email. So . . .

On Aug. 13, at 3:53 p.m., the package arrived in a “shipping partner facility” in Hauppauge, N.Y.

On Aug. 14, at 10 a.m., “shipping label created, usps awaiting item.”

On Aug. 18, at 3:34 p.m., the item “departed shipping partner facility, usps awaiting item.”

On Aug. 18, at 7:19 p.m., “Item arrived at regional facility.” Uhh, it seems that “regional facility” is in Jamaica, N.Y. Apparently, it is an international distribution center.

As of early Monday ET, the item still was in Jamaica. I’m thinking it might turn into a Christmas gift. If the USPS survives Trumpism, that is.

In her latest musings, this one on the CFL’s inability to get a 2020 season off the ground, Patti Dawn Swansson points out that “Jennifer Lopez and Alex Rodriguez just forked out $40 million for new digs. Maybe Commish Randy (Ambrosie) should have hit up JLo and ARod instead of Trudeau the Younger for the $30 million.”

——

One more note from Swansson, who blogs right here as The River City Renegade: “Interesting how sports sheets across the land played the big CFL story. It was front page news in every rag on the Prairies. It was inside filler in the Toronto Sun (pages 8-9), the Montreal Gazette (page 2) and the Vancouver Sun (pages 6-7). The National Post, meanwhile, ran Scott Stinson’s column on a news page, beside a piece on Peter Nygard and rape. Little wonder that those are Rouge Football’s three worst markets.”

Burger

Headline at TheOnion.com: Manchester United calls up top-rated hooligan from development league.

Headline at fark.com: After sweeping the Marlins and Cardinals, COVID moves on to face the Reds.

Barry Beck, one of the greatest players in WHL history, never will be able to come to grips with the murder of his son Brock, 20, who died on July 26 in Binbrook, Ont., near Hamilton. . . . The Beck family now has started a GoFundMe in the hopes of raising $100,000 as reward money as the search for a killer or killers continues. . . . Postmedia’s Brad Hunter has more right here.

Jack Finarelli, aka The Sports Curmudgeon, with a Thought for the Day, this one from Will Rogers: “I’m not really a movie star. I’m still married to the same woman for 28 years.”

COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .

The football team at Vanderbilt U has had to dial it down after the school announced an unknown number of positive tests. The announcement was made Friday, after SEC teams began practising on Monday. The school revealed what it said were a “small number” of positives within the football program. . . . The Commodores had at least five players opt out of the season.  . . .

Dwight Perry, in the Seattle Times: “Twenty big-league teams — two-thirds of them, that is — have amassed more strikeouts than hits at the plate this season. Belated 2020 MLB motto: ‘Get a whiff of this!’ ” . . .

Perry, again: “Taking no chances with flying or bussing after the pandemic sidelined them for 17 days, the St. Louis Cardinals took 41 rental cars to get to a doubleheader in Chicago. In baseball parlance, that’s what you call a long line drive.” . . .

Bob Molinaro, in the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, on the folly of trying to play college sports amid a pandemic: “Schools that initially invited students back to campus are quickly discovering what they should have known. When dealing with easily transmissible viruses, dorms are cruise ships without the water.” . . .

Mark Divver later added that “the Alaska teams — Fairbanks and Kenai River — are likely to play in Minnesota until at least Jan. 1. . . . The NAHL plans on opening its regular season on Oct. 9.

——

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

——

Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604.875.5182 or 1.855.875.5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

——

Or, for more information, visit right here.

Forget about WHL players skating for junior A teams prior to the WHL’s regular season starting. The WHL is aiming for a Dec. 4 start, with the MJHL hoping to get going on Oct. 9. . . . Mike Sawatzky of the Winnipeg Free Press reports right here that according to sources, “the WHL has decided it will not be releasing roster players to play in the MJHL, Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League, Alberta Junior Hockey League or B.C. Hockey League to start 2020-21.”

Steve Simmons, in the Toronto Sun: “The NBA informed teams this week they are no longer allowed to report injuries in any kind of general terms. They must use specific reasons and body parts. In other words, none of that ‘unfit to play’ NHL nonsense for the NBA, which has at least one gambling website as an advertiser on its playoff broadcasts.”

That, of course, won’t ever fly with the NHL or a lot of other hockey leagues, what with transparency being Public Enemy No. 1 with shinny people. Watching the Covid Cup playoffs unfold on TV, I wonder if the independent media and the fans are starting to realize just how unimportant, perhaps even meaningless, they are in the NHL’s scheme of things? Does ticket revenue mean much so long as the fans watch on TV and dig deep for the merch?

JUST NOTES: I’m dying here. I stumbled on a Facebook group — Shit Parkers of Kamloops!!! — that would have made me spit out my coffee had I been having breakfast. A quick scan of the pics showed that I’m in the clear, at least for now. . . . Kelly Olynyk, who is from Kamloops, and the Miami Heat get their first chance to eliminate the Indiana Pacers from the NBA playoffs today, 3:30 p.m. PT (TSN), in the NBA bubble in Orlando. On Saturday, Olynyk had nine rebounds, all at the defensive end, in a 124-115 victory that gave the Heat a 3-0 edge in the best-of-seven series. Whenever I watch Olynyk, I have to remind myself that, yes, he’s from Kamloops. . . . Obviously, the Vancouver Canucks are going to have to raise their game if they are to compete with the Vegas Golden Knights in the NHL bubble in Edmonton. But can the Canucks get to a level that high? . . . After Sunday night’s 5-0 Vegas victory, the only question left to be answered might be this: Will we ever see G Marc-Andre Fleury get another start for the Golden Knights?

Glitter

MLB just isn’t what it used to be . . . Sea Dogs lay out season-ticket, seating plans . . . No fans for Derby

In his Friday posting, Jack Finarelli, aka The Sports Curmudgeon, dropped the curmudgeonly gavel on MLB, and I can’t disagree with him. Here is part of what he wrote:

“I have not been overly impressed with MLB games on TV this season. To be clear, I am not talking about the absence of fans in the seats or the cardboard cutouts of fans; the games are not compelling. Most teams have played about 25 games so far; for 2020, that is 40 per cent of the season.  Here are some stats:

“Five teams – 20 per cent of the teams in MLB – are hitting below .220 as a team. . . . Four teams have an OBP below .300. . . . Twenty teams — 67 per cent of the teams in MLB — have more strikeouts than hits. . . . Twenty-nine of the thirty MLB teams have struck out at least  100 times more than they have walked. . . . Two teams are averaging 10 strikeouts per game.”

His entire post is right here.

And while we’re on the subject of MLB, hey, it’s about that extra-inning rule that puts a runner on second base to start each half inning.

Baseball once was a slave to statistics — there always had been a certain symmetry to it — and that is one of the things that so many fans loved about it. It isn’t anymore, unless it eventually will just erase all the numbers from this bastardization of a season. . . . I mean, we now get lead-off two-run home runs. . . . In a game between the Dodgers and Angels, the ghost runner stole third base and scored on a sacrifice fly by the leadoff hitter. Yes, a leadoff SF. . . . Jayson Stark of The Athletic pointed out that there has even been a two-up, three-down inning that included the ghost runner getting doubled up. . . . 

And here’s one that hasn’t happened yet, but is likely to at some point. As former MLP pitcher Ryan Dempster explained to Stark: “What about: You come in with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth inning and you get the guy out. So you’re the hero. Then you go back out and pitch the 10th, and you get a punchout and a groundout, and then they take you out. And now the other guy comes in and gives up a single, and you get the loss. If that doesn’t sum up 2020, I don’t know what would.”

If you’re a baseball fan, you don’t want to miss Stark’s columns from The Useless Info Dept.

What do you know about your kidneys:

Earlier this week, the QMJHL’s Saint John Sea Dogs released season-ticket information for the approaching season. . . . Their home arena, the TD Station, seats 6,307. Last season, the Sea Dogs’ average attendance was 3,345. This season, the Sea Dogs are expecting to be allowed to use about 25 per cent of the seats, so that means attendance will be capped at about 1,500 per game. . . . One of the results of that is an increase in season-ticket prices, from $499 to $575, even though there will be four fewer games (60) this season. . . . There are other changes, too. From a Sea Dogs news release: “Some of the bigger changes include very limited capacity (around 25% of seats), social bubbles, and masks once you get inside TD Station. Also, because of all the changes to the seating plan, you shouldn’t expect to sit in your same seat, and possibly not in your same section as last season.” . . . Jamie Tozer of Station Nation has more right here.

COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .

The NHL’s Arizona Coyotes laid off and furloughed an unspecified number of employees on Friday, citing financial issues caused by the pandemic. . . . The Coyotes, who furloughed half their business staff in April, were eliminated from the NHL playoffs on Wednesday when they lost to the Colorado Avalanche in Edmonton. . . . Earlier in the week, the Washington Post reported that Monumental Sports & Entertainment, owner of the Washington Capitals, Washington Mystics and Washington Wizards, was about to furlough 232 employees. . . .

In recent times, I have on occasion mentioned the apparent link between COVID-19 and myocarditis, which is an inflammation of the heart. . . . Amanda Christovich of frontofficesports.com has a whole lot more on this issue right here. . . .

The MLS’s Chicago Fire has had a player test positive. The unidentified player didn’t travel with the team for a Thursday game against host FC Cincinnati on Thursday. The Fire lost, 3-0. . . . The Fire said the team is asymptomatic and self-isolating. . . . 

The U of Iowa has decided to drop men’s gymnastics, men’s and women’s swimming and diving, and men’s tennis when the 2020-21 academic year ends. . . . In a statement, the school said it “projects lost revenue of approximately $100 million and an overall deficit between $60-$75 million this fiscal year. . . .

Australia has withdrawn its teams from the IIHF’s 2021 U20 World Championship Division III and U18 Women’s World Championship Division II Group A, citing travel restrictions in place due to the pandemic. . . . The U20 event is scheduled for Mexico City from Jan. 10-17, 2021. . . . The U18 women’s tournament is to be played in Dumfries, Great Britain, Jan. 19-22, 2021. . . . 

Athletics Canada has cancelled the 2020 Canadian cross-country championships that were to have been held in Abbotsford, B.C., on Nov 28. The event would have drawn about 800 competitors. . . . 

The Kentucky Derby, originally scheduled for May 2, will run before empty grandstands on Sept. 5. The pooh-bahs at Churchill Downs had said they would limit attendance to 23,000. That changed because of the way the virus is spreading in Kentucky, which had 2,300 new cases this week. . . . 

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

——

Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604.875.5182 or 1.855.875.5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

——

Or, for more information, visit right here.

Taras McEwen has taken over as the head coach of the MJHL’s Winnipeg Blues. He already was the general manager. . . . McEwen has coaching experience with Fort Knox of the junior B Prairie Junior Hockey League and with the SJHL’s Notre Dame Hounds. . . . The Blues also have named Zach Heisinger as an assistant coach. Last season, he was an assistant coach with the Vincent Massey team in the Winnipeg High School Hockey League. He also spent two seasons as an assistant coach with the Manitoba Major Junior Hockey League’s Fort Garry Twins. . . . The Blues are owned by 50 Below Sports + Entertainment, which also owns the WHL’s Winnipeg Ice. . . . McEwen was the Ice’s manager of scouting. His father, Brad, is Hockey Canada’s head scout. . . . Heisinger’s father, Craig, is the assistant GM and director of hockey operations with the NHL’s Winnipeg Jets, while a brother, Jake, is the Ice’s assistant GM and vice-president of hockey operations.

Morin’s search for kidney continues . . . It isn’t easy to ask someone for an organ

Vic2

More than a year ago, Todd Sullivan of Kamloops This Week did a story about Vic Morin of Kamloops.

At the time, it was 2019’s National Kidney Month and March 15 was World Kidney Day.

Morin was an appropriate subject because he had been living with chronic kidney disease (CKD) for some time.

VicColleen
Colleen Bruce and Vic Morin, at the Kamloops Kidney Support Group’s Christmas luncheon on Dec. 1. (Photo: Murray Mitchell/Murray Mitchell Photography)

“Though Morin’s situation isn’t currently desperate,” Sullivan wrote, Morin and his wife, Colleen Bruce, “have been urged to start the process of finding a live donor as it can take some time to connect with a correct match.”

Well, here we are more than a year later and Morin’s situation is getting desperate. He is doing peritoneal dialysis (PD) now and a donor has yet to be found.

Someone doing PD has a catheter implanted into their peritoneal cavity and does dialysis at home. Morin hooks up to a cycler every night as he goes to bed and fluid exchanges that remove toxins take place via the catheter as he sleeps.

Dialysis, no matter whether it’s hemo or PD, really cuts into a person’s quality of life and a new kidney can make a lot of that go away.

But asking someone to hand over one of their kidneys isn’t the easiest thing in the world to do. It’s not like asking a friend to loan you a baseball mitt for a game of slo-pitch.

As Morin told Sullivan: “It’s very awkward to go and try to ask someone to be a donor. That’s the hardest part.”

Neither Bruce nor a brother were deemed to be a match for Morin, so the search continues.

Bruce also has decided to get more aggressive with that search, so has designed the poster that accompanies this piece in the hopes that the right person sees it and chooses to register to be a live donor.

There is information below on how to go about registering for the Living Kidney Donor Program at St. Paul’s Hospital in Vancouver. The beauty of this program is that you wouldn’t have to be a match with Morin in order to help him. Rather, you are able to register and should you prove after testing to be an eligible donor you could donate a kidney to someone else on the provision that Morin gets one from an unknown donor who is a match.

For example, that’s how my wife, Dorothy, got a kidney almost seven years ago. She had been doing PD for four years. Her best friend had wanted to donate a kidney to her but wasn’t a match. Through the Living Kidney Donor Program at St. Paul’s, she gave to someone else, while Dorothy received a kidney from a stranger.

If you are the least bit interested in being a donor, use the contact information listed here in order to learn all about it.

Should you choose to get in touch with the program at St. Paul’s, mention Louis Victor Morin.

——

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

Or, for more information, visit right here.

——

Six months ago, actor Michael Teigen gave one of his kidneys to friend Stephen Gillis, a Vancouver minor hockey coach who was diagnosed with kidney disease after having lived with Crohn’s disease. Gillis was doing hemodialysis when he underwent the transplant in December. . . . He is doing well, extremely well, but what about Teigen? Well, here he is . . .

——

Vic needs a kidney. Can you help? . . . QMJHL set for exhibition season . . . MJHL aiming for Oct. 9 opening

Dale Hawerchuk, the quiet NHL superstar, died on Tuesday, his battle with stomach cancer having taken him at 57. . . . Here’s Paul Friesen of the Winnipeg Sun: “The superstar who struck so many people with his humility reached out to a bunch of them over his final 72 hours. To say goodbye, and to tell them he loved them. Serge Savard, Teemu Selanne, Jeremy Roenick and many others received a call nobody wants to get, but one everybody who got will cherish.” . . . Scott Arniel, perhaps Hawerchuk’s best friend, talked with Friesen about his long-time friend and all the memories. That’s all right here and it’s wonderful.

The QMJHL will open its 51-game exhibition schedule on Sept. 1 and wrap it up on Sept. 26. It plans on opening its regular season on Oct. 1. . . . Each of the league’s 18 teams will play four, five, six or seven exhibition games. . . . According to the league, the Gatineau Olympiques, Halifax Mooseheads and Charlottetown Islanders “will play all of their preseason games in a neutral site as their buildings are currently not available.” . . . QMJHL teams are opening training camps on Aug. 30. . . . I haven’t been able to find a blanket statement, but it would appear that fans won’t be permitted at any of the exhibition games.

The MJHL announced on Wednesday that it is planning to open its 2020-21 regular season on Oct. 9. Training camps are to open on Sept. 18 with each team having 34 or fewer players on hand. . . . Each team will be permitted to play three exhibition games, with none of those against out-of-province teams. . . . From the MJHL news release: “Players/Staff and Officials are required to wear face masks while entering/exiting and within the arena for MJHL sanctioned activities while not on the ice. . . . Players/Staff are required to wear face masks while traveling to and from games (on the bus, entering/exiting restaurants and hotels, etc.) . . . Members of the public are strongly encouraged to wear face masks while in any MJHL facility during MJHL activity while following all necessary distancing and facility guidelines.” . . . The MJHL hasn’t yet released its schedule, but it did say that the schedule “will be significantly modified to mitigate risk of spread or potential contact between multiple teams and to allow for minimal disruption of the schedule in the event of a positive COVID-19 case.” . . . The complete news release is right here.

In a move aimed at saving money, the U of Alaska-Anchorage announced on Wednesday that it will be eliminating four sports, including hockey, after the 2020-21 season, whenever it may happen. . . . Also to be cancelled are men’s and women’s skiing and women’s gymnastics. . . . Meanwhile, the U of Alaska-Fairbanks issued a news release stating that it doesn’t have any plans to reduce the number of athletics programs that it supports.

COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .

Mikele Colasurdo, a freshman QB with Georgia State, revealed Thursday that he won’t play this season because of a heart condition that was diagnosed after he had a run-in with COVID-19. . . . He didn’t get at all specific about the condition, but myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart, has proven to be a potential after-effect from the virus. . . . 

The U of Notre Dame’s football team has had five players test positive and has quarantined six others after contact tracing. . . . The team is to experience another round of testing today (Friday). . . . Earlier this week, Notre Dame dumped in-person learning for remote instruction through at least Sept. 2. There have been 304 positive tests since students returned to campus. . . .  

The group that oversees high school sports in Saskatoon’s secondary schools has cancelled all sports this fall. That takes care of football, soccer, volleyball and cross-country. . . . On top of that, the city’s two school divisions — Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools and Saskatoon Public Schools — have cancelled all facility rentals, including gymnasiums, for the remainder of this year. . . . 

The Manitoba Soccer Association has informed all members that it “has been notified that an individual involved with the youth soccer community in the Winnipeg region has tested positive for COVID-19.” . . . According to the MSA, public health officials now are doing contact tracing. . . . 

The NFL’s Seattle Seahawks will play their first three homes games — Sept. 20, Sept. 27 and Oct. 11 — without any fans in CenturyLink Field. “While we are hopeful that conditions will improve as the season moves forward,” the team said in a statement, “we will continue to follow the lead of public health and government officials to make future decisions about having fans in attendance.” . . . 

MLB has had to dump more games, this time because the New York Mets have experienced positive tests. . . . The Mets have  had one unidentified player and one staff member test positive. . . . The Mets were to have played the host Miami Marlins on Thursday and the visiting New York Yankees today (Friday), but both games were postponed. It remains to be seen if Saturday and Sunday games with the Yankees go by the wayside, too. . . . All told, 16 MLB teams now have had games called because of COVID-19. . . .

Italy’s Serie A soccer league is trying to return from a shortened off-season — its previous season ended on Aug. 2 — but has had at least eight players test positive. Cagliari, Napoli, Roma and Torino all have had positives. . . . Serie A’s schedule is to begin on Sept. 19. . . .

The Montreal Impact are scheduled to play host to the Vancouver Whitecaps in an MLS game on Tuesday. And the Impact says it will have fans — a maximum of 250 of them — in the seats at State Saputo. . . . The Whitecaps have three home games scheduled for September, but have said they’ll play without fans. . . . With the U.S.-Canada border closed to non-essential travel, Canada’s MLS teams are only playing against each other. . . . 

The Winnipeg High School Football League is on hold, at least for now. . . . In a statement released Thursday, Jeffrey Bannon, the league’s commissioner, said: “Based upon the approval of Football Manitoba’s Return to Play Stage 2, ‘Stay & Play,’ the WHSFL is now in conversations with each school division and their member teams to determine the future of any resemblance of a 2020 season.” . . . Training camps that were to have begun on Aug. 24 have been postponed indefinitely. . . . 

From a Thursday news release: “The World of Outlaws announced today that several drivers and crew members have tested positive. . . .” One driver tested positive after last weekend’s races at Knoxville Raceway. Two crew members subsequently also tested positive. . . . After contact tracing, “several other participants and families have tested positive. So far, symptoms appear minor.”

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

——

Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604.875.5182 or 1.855.875.5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

——

Or, for more information, visit right here.

Hockey world is mourning loss of Hawerchuk . . . Here’s hoping CFL is able to find itself

As you no doubt are aware, the CFL won’t happen in 2020. For the first time since 1919, the Grey Cup won’t be awarded.

(There wasn’t a Grey Cup game for four years — 1916-19 — because of the First World War. The CFL didn’t pause for the Second World War.)

I would suggest that this day of reckoning has been in the CFL’s windshield for a few years now. I don’t know exactly when it was that the CFL came to the fork in the road and took the wrong one, but somewhere along the way it lost track of who it is.

Hopefully it can find itself over the next few months. Hopefully it can figure out where the fans went in Edmonton and Toronto and B.C. Hopefully it can get things back on track in Montreal. Hopefully it can get back to being the CANADIAN Football League.

I spent a fair amount of time around the CFL and its teams while with the Winnipeg Tribune and Regina Leader-Post through 1999. It hurts to see this happen to the CFL, but here’s hoping it comes back with a redesign that makes it bigger and better whenever COVID-19 allows another season to be held. . . .

In the meantime, two columnists I worked with while in Regina took a look at the CFL and the situation in which it now finds itself. . . . Ed Willes of Postmedia has his take right here, while Rob Vanstone of The Leader-Post has a column right here. . . . Ed Tait of the Blue Bombers has a terrific piece right here with thoughts from LB Adam Bighill and QB Zach Collaros. . . . Here’s part of what Collaros had to say: “The optics of going to the federal government without consulting with us at all was definitely tough. Guys were definitely not happy about that. It’s kind of a microcosm of how this pandemic has been handled from leadership in North America. The transparency is not there, the communication hasn’t been great. That needs to improve moving forward if 2021 is going to be successful.”

Fans of the Vancouver Canucks have had to put their plans for a Stanley Cup parade on hold since their favourites now find themselves at 2-2 with the defending-champion St. Louis Blues in the opening round of the NHL’s bubble tournament. . . . The Canucks, you may recall, won the first two games, only to have the Blues wake up in time for a 3-2 OT victory in Game 3 on Sunday, and then pound their way to a 3-1 triumph on Monday. . . . The Blues have gotten more and more physical with the Canucks young guns, especially Elias Pettersson, as the series has worn on. How the Canucks and Pettersson respond in Game 5 tonight will tell the story.

Meanwhile, the NHL revealed on Monday that it completed the third week of its return to play without any positive tests. There had been 5,640 tests administered through Aug. 15. . . . Yes, if everyone is on the same page with the same goal in mind, the bubble approach does work.

Nuts

COVID-19 CHRONICLES . . .

The U of Notre Dame reported 147 positive tests — 146 students and one staff member — on Tuesday, so suspended in-person classes for two weeks just eight days into the fall semester. Some of the positives apparently were traced to an off-campus party where there were neither masks nor social distancing. . . . The U of North Carolina at Chapel Hill cancelled in-person undergraduate classes on Monday with at least 135 positive tests on campus. A spokesperson said that as of Monday morning, there were 177 students in isolation and 349 in quarantine. . . . Also on Tuesday, Michigan State ordered undergrads to stay home for the remainder of the fall. MSU hadn’t yet started its fall semester when it told students to say home “effective immediately.” . . . In a letter to students, Samuel Stanley Jr., MSU’s president, said the move was due to the “current status of the virus in our country — particularly what we are seeing at other institutions as they re-populate their campus communities.” . . .

The Atlanta Braves have placed OF Nick Markakis on the 10-day IL because he may have been exposed to the virus. Interestingly, Markakis, 36, originally opted out of playing this season. However, he changed his mind and returned to the Braves shortly after the season began. . . .

Here’s Bob Molinaro of the Hampton Roads Virginian-Pilot with a pertinent observation: “Something’s wrong with the business model at many American universities when the cancellation of a football season threatens to wreck a school’s budget.”

If you are interested in being a living kidney donor, more information is available here:

Living Kidney Donor Program

St. Paul’s Hospital

6A Providence Building

1081 Burrard Street

Vancouver, BC V6Z 1Y6

Tel: 604-806-9027

Toll free: 1-877-922-9822

Fax: 604-806-9873

Email: donornurse@providencehealth.bc.ca

——

Vancouver General Hospital Living Donor Program – Kidney 

Gordon and Leslie Diamond Health Care Centre

Level 5, 2775 Laurel Street

Vancouver, BC V5Z 1M9

604.875.5182 or 1.855.875.5182

kidneydonornurse@vch.ca

——

Or, for more information, visit right here.

Stars

The 16-team USHL announced Tuesday that it hopes to open a 54-game regular season on Nov. 6 and wrap it up on April 24. Teams will open training camps on Sept. 14 with exhibition games to start in mid-October. . . . From a news release: “All activities are designed to take place in accordance with local, state and federal guidelines as well as the League’s Return to Play Protocols which are currently being finalized. The regular season schedule allows for flexibility for games to be moved to the back of the schedule due to postponements, capacity restrictions, or other factors.” . . . The news release didn’t make any mention of the situation in Des Moines, Iowa, where Buccaneer Arena, the home of the USHL’s Buccaneers, was damaged by an intense storm on Aug. 10. The ImOn Ice Arena in Cedar Rapids, the home of the RoughRiders, also suffered some damage.

These leagues are hoping to start their 2020-21 regular seasons on these proposed dates:

AHL: Dec. 4

AJHL: Sept. 18

BCHL: Dec. 1

ECHL: Dec. 4

Heritage Junior B Hockey League: Oct. 28

KHL: Sept. 2

KIJHL: Oct. 2

MJHL: Sept. 25

NAHL: Oct. 9

NHL: Dec. 1

OHL: Dec. 1

Pacific Junior Hockey League: Sept. 29

QMJHL: Oct. 1

SJHL: Oct. 9

USHL: Nov. 6

Vancouver Island Junior Hockey League: Sept. 7 (48 games), Oct. 12 (40), Nov. 16 (40), Dec. 14 (32)

WHL: Dec. 4

Paul McFarland now is the general manager and head coach of the OHL’s Kingston Frontenacs. An assistant coach with the NHL’s Toronto Maple Leafs in 2019-20, McFarland signed as Kingston’s head coach on May 8. He was named general manager on Tuesday. . . . The Frontenacs had been looking for a GM since July 23 when they announced that they wouldn’t be renewing Darren Kelly’s contract. . . . Prior to his one season with the Maple Leafs, McFarland was an assistant coach with the NHL’s Florida Panthers for two seasons.

Plaid