Football helps Stamps heal in return to the field

CALGARY — At a time of sorrow, the Calgary Stampeders are using football to heal.

The Stamps returned to practice on Tuesday for the first time since the death of Mylan Hicks, whose life was tragically taken at age 23 in an act of violence early Sunday morning.

For Head Coach Dave Dickenson and many others, returning to the field was therapeutic.

“It’s not ever going to be the same,” said Dickenson. “But you’ve got to try to get back to who you are and just take care of yourselves and your family.

“We are football players, football coaches – it’s what we do,” he added. “It felt good to get the boys back together, for me at least. I was happy to have the team back in and good to get back out on the field.”

Photo Courtesy: Michigan State Athletics

Photo: Michigan State Athletics

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“It’s very tough,” said fullback Rob Cote. “Football, for us, I think for a lot of people, is very therapeutic. Guys coming in, you could see by the end of practice the mood was very different than when we came in today.

“You don’t know what to think, how to act,” he continued. “We come in here and we can use this – the best thing we can do right now is to listen to ourselves and try and put our best foot forward in Mylan’s name. Let’s come out here and use football for what it can be for us and that’s a little bit of therapy sometimes.”

Hicks, a defensive back who attended Michigan State, had a stint with the San Francisco 49ers of the NFL before joining the Stampeders’ practice roster in May as a free agent.

The tragedy struck less than 24 hours after the Stampeders’ last-second win over the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. The mood surrounding Tuesday’s practice was sombre, but at the same time a necessary step in the healing process.

Among those grieving and reflecting on Hicks’ life on Tuesday was defensive back Jamar Wall, whose request to switch from number 29 to Hicks’ number 31 was granted by the team.

PHOTOS: Stampeders return to practice with heavy hearts

 

“That was just something in my heart I felt like we needed to do,” said Wall of taking Hicks’ number. “I felt like we’re a family. It’s not just at team or anything – we buy into each other, we spend multiple hours with each other and I feel like that was something I should do being a leader on the back-end and him being in my position, loving him like a true brother, that would be my privilege to do that, in honour of him and the hard work that he came in day in and day out.”

Wall, a defensive back and a veteran of five seasons, said Hicks was a player he was trying to take under his wing.

“He never got a chance to play in an actual game,” said Wall, “but if you’ve seen him in practice, he was constantly flying around, constantly doing what he was supposed to do, kept to himself.

“I love that. I feel like that’s who I am . . . It hit me. It hit me really hard and I just felt like that was something I needed to do.

“No one got to see what he could do but I think he would have been a great football player.”

 

While the Stampeders turn their attention to the Ticats, who they face on Saturday in Hamilton, they vow not to forget their fallen teammate. Instead, they’ll play football for him — what they believe he’d want them to do.

“Football seems like it doesn’t matter at a time like this,” said Cote. “It’s just a game. It seems insignificant, but at the same time, talking with my family and thinking about it, if this was me, there’s nothing he would want us to do except to go out here and dedicate it to him. Work as hard as we can, go out there and try and achieve something great in his name and know that he’s with us and had a great impact on us.”

“He was a family member,” added Wall. “He was a soldier that rode with us who bought into our system and was one of us .

“At the same time, it’s gonna bring us closer. We have to keep going. We have to continue to move on with our lives. That’s just part of life. That’s a bad part of it but it’s something that happens and it’s something that we have to do and we’ll get through it together.”

– With files from Stampeders.com