SHREVEPORT, La. (AP) - Saturday (Dec. 14) night, the Lone Star Brahmas were fueled by the life of a woman they didn’t know anything about 20 hours prior. As they took the ice to face the Shreveport Mudbugs on George’s Pond at Hirsch Coliseum, they still didn’t know her name.
No disrespect, but the woman probably didn’t know the Brahmas existed, either.
On Friday night, the Brahmas, the best team in the North American Hockey League, were dismantled by the Mudbugs on George’s Pond at Hirsch Coliseum, but the loss was soon put in perspective.
On the way back to the team’s hotel in Shreveport, the Brahmas’ bus was involved in a fatal three-car accident. While stopped at a light just blocks from the hotel, a driver – who has since been charged with driving while intoxicated — slammed into an SUV behind the bus and catapulted the SUV into the back of the bus.
Amid the chaos, after realizing the Brahmas, for the most part, were unscathed, team members attempted to help those in other vehicles.
Lone Star forward Matt Guerra and best friend Joey Baez were among those who assisted the then-anonymous woman in the SUV, but there was nothing they could do. Lauren Christen Davis, 29, of Barksdale Air Force Base, died at the scene while strangers held her hand.
Davis is a mother and a wife.
“After that day, things will never be the same,” Lone Star owner Frank Trazzera said.
The rivalry between the Brahmas and the Mudbugs spans more than two decades. It’s fierce, and has intensified through the years thanks to the number of players and coaches who have been a part of both organizations.
However, in the wee hours of Saturday morning, the hockey community became one family, foes immediate friends.
“The battles are left on the ice,” Mudbugs general manager Scott Muscutt said. “That’s just hockey. If you handled that situation any differently, you would be disrespecting the game that is life, let alone (Brahmas head coach) Danny Wildfong, who is still a Mudbug.”
Life on the road has always been dangerous, no matter the sport, the level or the size of the team, but the Humboldt bus tragedy increased the sleepless nights for owners, coaches and parents.
In April of 2018, 16 people were killed when the Humboldt Broncos hockey team bus was dismantled by an 18-wheeler near Armley, Saskatchewan. The Broncos are a junior team featuring players 20-years-old and under – the same age as teams in the NAHL, like the Brahmas and the Mudbugs.
“The danger crosses your mind more than once every trip,” Mudbugs head coach Jason Campbell said. “When (Humboldt) happened it made things worse mentally.”
According to Jul Guerra, father of Matt Guerra, 3 minutes before Friday’s tragedy father and son were talking about what went wrong in the Brahmas’ loss to the Mudbugs.
“On the first call, I asked him why he tripped the (Mudbugs’) kid on opening draw?” Jul Guerra told The Times.
Ten minutes later, Matt placed another call to his dad in Florida. Matt knew his father would freak out.
“I tried to give the good news first,” Matt said. “Usually, I give them the bad news first, but I had to tell them everyone was all right.”
Matt Guerra was happy his parents were correctly informed, but there was still so much to process, especially for his best friend, teammate and fellow Floridian Joey Baez.
“Joey and me were in that car trying to pull (Davis) out and making sure she was OK,” Guerra said. “It’s such a traumatizing thing to see somebody take their last breath.”
One year ago, the 19-year-old Baez lost his father to cancer. Upon seeing a car seat in Davis’ vehicle, those on the scene knew at least one child was suddenly without its mother.
“We’ve been close since we were kids, so I can definitely see how that was another traumatizing experience,” Matt said of Joey. “All the boys rallied around him to make sure he was OK.”
Said Wildfong: “It’s real emotion. There were guys holding that lady’s hand when she passed – that’s real.”
Meanwhile, the Mudbugs quickly took action. After receiving a call from Wildfong, Muscutt went to work.
“We got away scot free – just some bumps,” Wildfong said. “I can’t thank the Mudbugs family enough for helping us.”
Members of the Mudbugs visited the Brahmas after midnight and made sure the team, whose bus was out of commission, had transportation to the rink for Saturday’s game.
“This is totally separate from the game on the ice,” Campbell said. “Off the ice, hockey is family. We know they’re going to compete their butts off on the ice, but when you have a tragedy like that, whether we knew Fonger or not, we’d jump to help anybody like that, and other teams would do the same for us.”
More than 200 miles away, at the Brahmas’ home base in North Richland Hills, Texas, billet families, fans and Trazzera gathered for a spur-of-the-moment caravan to Shreveport.
“The text messages, phone calls, emails started rolling in,” Trazzera said. “One fan rented a 12-passenger van. The hockey family is unbelievable. This wasn’t about hockey players – there were just people helping each other.”
Trazzera drove an RV to Shreveport to load up the Brahmas equipment, while the caravan pulled out following Saturday’s game.
Oh yeah, there was a game played Saturday.
The Brahmas dug deep and mauled the Mudbugs from the get-go. Lone Star scored three goals in the first 8 minutes and cruised to a bittersweet 3-1 victory.
Matt Guerra believes Wildfong’s focus on mental toughness paid off as his team navigated adversity.
“I’m really proud of these guys,” Guerra said. “(Coach) was able to change our mindset quick.”
Wildfong had a simple message when the team gathered Saturday morning.
“It’s not about us,” he said. “I talked about the lady who died. We’re more worried about the family that lost a mom, a loved one, a friend.”
The two points earned Saturday bolstered the Brahmas’ position at the top of the South Division. In a rare instance, that meant nothing.
“We rallied together around that woman who passed away. We played for her,” Guerra said.
Now they know their effort wasn’t for a nameless woman, or a highway statistic.
The victory was for Lauren Christen Davis.
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