Rasmus Sandin was on his way to practice in January 2022 when he learned about his mother’s diagnosis. His mom, Helena, was 3,900 miles away at the family’s home in Sweden. He was in Canada with the Toronto Maple Leafs, with whom he started his NHL career. There wasn’t much he could do to help.
“It was tough,” recalled Sandin, now a defenseman for the Washington Capitals. “I’m pretty much on the other side of the world, so I can’t see her right away, even though I wanted to. Luckily, I had only a couple months left in the season. Spent the summer with her. But it was definitely tough. Scary, too.”
Helena was initially diagnosed with ovarian cancer, but it quickly spread to other organs in her abdomen, requiring “a very big surgery,” Sandin said. Nearly two years after her diagnosis, Helena is doing “way better,” and Sandin, who kept his mother’s health quiet for much of his time in Toronto, is ready to share his family’s experience.
The Capitals are set to host their annual Hockey Fights Cancer game Saturday against the Columbus Blue Jackets. It will be Sandin’s fourth such game and his second since his immediate family was touched by the disease.
“It’s always been a special time of year, I feel like, because obviously it’s a terrible disease,” the 23-year-old said. “But of course it gets a little more special. It’s something that I’m trying to do, too — spread awareness and trying to raise as much money as we can to try to find a cure for it. I love this time of year. Of course, it’s a little bit more special now.”
The NHL and the players union launched the Hockey Fights Cancer initiative in 1998. For the past 25 years, every fall — and one spring, during the pandemic-adjusted 2020-21 season — across the league, each team has taken a night to honor those diagnosed with cancer and raise money to find a cure. According to the league, the initiative has raised more than $32 million.
One of the most visible ways in which players have helped with the fundraising is by wearing lavender jerseys, which are donned in warmups and then auctioned off, along with signed pucks, signed sticks and other memorabilia. Lavender is the NHL’s color for Hockey Fights Cancer month, and for each team’s awareness game, nearly everything that can be lavender, from the in-arena graphics to the coaches’ ties, is swathed in the color.
But as part of the NHL’s ban on specialty warmup jerseys, which was implemented in large part because several players refused to wear specialty gear on nights supporting the LGBTQ+ community, the Hockey Fights Cancer jerseys will no longer be featured on the ice.
“I’ve suggested that it would be appropriate for clubs not to change their jerseys in warmups because it’s become a distraction,” NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman told Sportsnet in June. The NHL board of governors agreed with Bettman and adopted the new rule.
Teams are allowed to let players wear specialty jerseys off the ice, and the Capitals plan to have their players walk into Saturday’s game wearing Hockey Fights Cancer jerseys that will be signed and put up for auction.
For years, though, the sight of lavender in warmups was an indelible part of each team’s Hockey Fights Cancer game. And Sandin was blunt in sharing his opinion on the league’s change of stance.
“It sucks,” Sandin said. “It’s that simple. I think it’s terrible that we didn’t have any say and we can’t raise our voices in that kind of way, with wearing the jerseys.”
Not being able to wear the jersey on the ice is frustrating for Sandin, but he remains a vocal advocate.
Sandin and his father, Patric, are involved with a golf tournament that raises money for a cancer charity in Sweden — they first participated in 2021, before Helena’s diagnosis. Sandin is actively involved with Washington’s initiatives related to cancer awareness, including the team’s skate last month with children who have been affected by cancer.
“It was great just to talk to some of them and see what some of them have been through,” Sandin said. “It’s crazy, especially when they’re kids, too, and being so young. It feels good in the body and the mind, just being able to spend a couple minutes or an hour or so with some kids and see them smile and be happy about that.”
Sandin, who often wears a beaded bracelet that reads “F--- Cancer,” is passionate about raising awareness for the disease and, eventually, finding a cure — particularly after gaining firsthand experience.
“It’s something that I hold very close to my heart, and my whole family does,” he said. “That’s why I think it sucks we can’t wear the jerseys, but at the same time, I think we can still do a lot of stuff with it.”
