While Black, Asian, Indian, and Indigenous people have played ice hockey since the sport’s inception, the demographic is predominantly white at all levels, from the front office to the bleachers. The opportunity is there to expand the sport to under-represented people, but copious roadblocks stand in the way of progress. However, a show of unity in the 2020 NHL playoff “bubble,” and the current season, is a beacon of what can be accomplished.

With the lights of Amalie Arena dimmed blue on the Tampa Bay Lightning’s opening night back in October of 2017, in a sea of his white counterparts, during the national anthem Tampa forward J.T Brown stood on the bench with his head bowed and his right fist raised. The hockey world erupted.

With permission from friends and family in active duty, the team owner, coaches, and his teammates, Brown became the first-ever NHL player to demonstrate a peaceful protest during a game. This symbolic protest was in response to countless instances of police brutality and racial injustice. In particular, a response to the acquittal of the Minnesota police officer who shot and killed Philando Castille the year prior.

To Brown, who is black, a raised fist symbolizes “solidarity, support, strength, and even resistance,” but too much of the hockey world and the nation, it meant something entirely different. Just over a year after Colin Kapernick shocked the world in

a similar demonstration against racial injustice, the country had an all too familiar reaction of distaste and misunderstanding. With that same fist Brown raised, resulting in a hateful response, he has swung at countless fighting opponents and shattered blocking a shot in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, bringing an entire arena to their feet. So a question goes to the league and the hockey world at large, when does the love end and the hate begin?

This demonstration resulted in Brown and his family receiving death threats and an incomprehensible amount of racial slurs and hateful comments in his social media feed. While he believed that this backlash signified that he had done the right thing, at that time, Brown acknowledged the league and its fans had a long way to go on the road toward acceptance.

Through this seemingly harmless protest, Brown not only shed light on the racial injustice in our country but also on the past experiences of minority players struggling in a league that alienated them.

Seven years before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 23-year-old Willie O’Ree became the first hockey player to break the color barrier in the NHL when the Boston Bruins called him up in 1958. Although a talented skater, O’Ree faced unimaginable detachment from players and fans and was never taken seriously by those consuming the sport throughout his long professional career. O’Ree paved the way for black hockey players to come, but many, like O’Ree, were never able to escape the stigma that loomed over them. Kevin Weekes, a current studio analyst for NHL Tonight, served as the Carolina Hurricanes netminder for three seasons. Weekes had a banana hurled toward him when exiting the ice at the Bell Centre after a 2-1 loss to Montreal in Game 3 of the 2002 Stanley Cup Playoff.

In 2010, then-Canadians star defenseman P.K Subban, now a New Jersey Devil, was criticized by TSN panelist Darren Pang for not playing hockey “the white way.” Additionally, the ever-common racist remark heard by Davante Smith-Pelley, Evander Kane, and Seth Jones to “stick to basketball” typically goes under the radar in hockey media.

Fast forward to 2020, the nation and much of the globe were in shock after Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin murdered George Floyd. In the few weeks since professional sports returned to action from the pandemic, the peaceful protests during the national anthem against racial injustice and police brutality became a widespread demonstration. Players in the NBA, MLB, MLS, and others peacefully took a knee, raised a fist, or supported their teammates during the anthem. However, pro- tests during the anthem were noticeably absent from the NHL’s restart at the “bubble” locations in Toronto and Edmonton. That changed a month later when Minnesota Wild forward Matt Dumba, who is black, raised his fist for the anthem in their first game of the NHL restart.

Nationwide, Vegas Golden Knights forward Ryan Reeves and goaltender Robin Lehner, along with Dallas Stars forward Tyler Seguin, all knelt beside each other for the American and Canadian national anthems.

What followed was a flurry of supportive responses and actions from teammates, other players, as well as league officials joining in on the spread of awareness. The league and the NHL Players Association joined up with the Hockey Diversity Alliance, founded by former NHLer Akim Ailu, to provide diversity training for all league members that will now take place at the start of every NHL season.

However, in August of last year the HDA published a pledge that asked the NHL and the NHLPA to make regarding funding programs and target hiring. After three months of silence on the league’s end, the HDA and the NHL effectively cut ties. From then on the Diversity Alliance has operated independently from the NHL.

The tendency of the NHL to continue to sweep this issue under the rug is evident when looking at the demographics throughout its timeline. But why? In the league’s 105-year history, why has there never been a black general manager, and only one black head coach has ever stood behind a bench? The on-ice representation isn’t any more diverse, with 26 current black players out of a league total of 736. Black NHL players since O’Ree have proven to be skilled enough to not only survive in the NHL, but have excelled. This being the case, why does the NHL still remain predominantly white?

It is clear that in the eyes of the NHL players involved in the Diversity Alliance that their league is not ready to make a solidified commitment to end the systematic racism that has been present in the league since its formation.

A year after these initiatives began league-wide, in the American Hockey League, after being pulled from a donnybrook, San Jose Barracuda forward Krystof Hrabik imitated the movement of a monkey towards Tucson Roadrunners defensemen Boko Imama, who is black. Hrabik did not face expulsion from the league. Instead, he faced a 30-game suspension which, when perusing the team’s schedule, equates to a little under half of the season Hrabik was still able to participate in.

In response, Imama pulled no punches. “I think it’s really hurting the sport because I think if it was more diverse, if everyone was more included, I feel like it would touch a bigger audience, and it would just be better for the sport. But when things like that happen, it’s just unfortunate for everyone.”

While both league-wide initiatives are decent steps toward addressing the racial issues that exist in the NHL, according to Edmonton Oilers forward Evander Kane, the league “needs more people that don’t look like me speaking out on these issues.”

As it stands, the NHL has come a long way since 1958. However, over the past ten years, it seems the NHL welcomes the idea of making changes rather than actually breaking ground on the steps to do so.