Former OHL goalie Gene Chiarello says hazing was “more damaging than brain cancer”

Former London Knights goaltender Gene Chiarello describes his rookie season during the 1996-97 campaign as “more confusing and damaging than the experience of a year-long fight with brain cancer in my mid-20s.”

Chiarello, now healthy after a fighting brain cancer after his junior hockey career, is coming forward and sharing his story of suffering abuse during his time in the OHL. He recently caught up with Ken Campbell of The Hockey News and Sports Illustrated to share some of the details of the allegations against the OHL and... frankly it's quite disturbing.

Check out some of these quotes from Chiarello:

“I and my rookie teammates should be welcomed and it was quite the opposite. I just thought it was so counterproductive to what we were all trying to accomplish. I mean, how does that foster any sort of team cohesiveness or team chemistry? It just doesn’t. To be on a bus going to a road game and to be thrown into the lavatory with no clothes on and then show up at a road game and have all of us pull the same jersey over our heads and be a team, it was just a real confusing time.”

Chiarello and other plaintiffs highlighted rookie parties where first-year underage players were forced to drink to excess. At the rookie party that season, the rookies were mandated to donate their first $80 paycheck, which represented two weeks pay, to buy liquor for the event. Chiarello said in his affidavit that at one point in the evening, one of the rookies went missing and was later found passed out in a tree, “sitting on a branch while leaning his upper body up against the tree trunk. He was perched at least 10 feet in the air, which could have resulted in a severe injury if he would have fallen to the ground if unconscious.”

Chiarello also talked about something called, ‘the pit’, where a rookie would be called to the back of the bus, then would be covered in blankets and repeatedly punched by veteran players.

And honestly... that's just the tip of the iceberg, so to speak.

For the full article from Campbell, click below: