A number of former UNO hockey players came back to Omaha tonight, for a special alumni game at Baxter Arena
They hit the ice to raise money for the families of the 16 members of the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team who died in a horrific bus accident in Saskatchewan, Canada on April 6th. For the former Mavs, the tragedy hit very close to home.
"We're here to raise money for the Humboldt families of the junior hockey team up in Canada. They were on their way to a playoff game and had a bus accident and 16 of their players were killed. So we decided as a hockey community to do our part and see if we could raise some money to help out their families."
"Being on a bus is something that every guy that is playing this game today did for a long period of time so when you have something like this happen it really hits home because it could be any of us" said former Mav Bryan Marshall
"At the beginning of the first couple of hours from 3-5 we had just an open skate and you could come and just skate on the rink. we had a bunch of donations from a bunch of different businesses in the community and we put a bunch of things into raffle baskets."
"You know, having fun and positivity, obviously the cause is a difficult situation but we want to promote positivity throughout the situation" said former Mav Matt White.
"It was fun to watch them play and you see some of the guys when they don't play hockey, they blimp out like the rest of us. That was kind of cool!"
"People that are going to be here watching will get a kick out of seeing a lot of familiar faces they haven't seen with hockey equipment on for a long time."
"It was fun. It was good to come out for a little bit."
Organizers of the fundraiser tweeted that the event was amazing. They do not have an official total yet, but say it raised more than $7,000.
