This is obviously a heartbreaking situation, but Wild defenseman Marco Scandella talked this morning about saying goodbye last week to his ailing father.
His dad, Francesco, is dying of prostate cancer. If you read my fun profile last February on Scandella (here's the link, so please give it a read), you know just how much Scandella loves and respects his dad and credits his parents for making him the person he is today.
"My dad doesn't have much time left, so I'm really happy that the organization let me go back home to see him and say goodbye to him," Scandella, who missed two games, said. "I wouldn't be where I am today without him. Family's going to miss him, and I'm just happy to have great teammates and it's great to be back with everybody and be back and be busy and be playing with this team."
Scandella, his eyes welled with tears and taking deep breaths, saying, "It's tough saying goodbye. It's not an easy situation, but at least I got to say goodbye to him. I definitely learned a lot from him. He taught me most of what I know today. I'm just going to have to keep proving his name and being a great person, a great player and just doing what he taught me."
But Scandella said it's time to concentrate on hockey, saying he "owes it to him to play my best hockey, and that's what I'm going to do shift in and shift out and just keep growing as a player and keep growing as a person. I have a lot to thank to my dad. It's a tough situation, but I just have to keep playing hard. Life goes on, but it was definitely good to go say goodbye to him."
Scandella returned to the team in Dallas just after midnight Saturday. Hours later, Scandella scored a third-period tying goal to force overtime.
"Definitely scored that goal for him," Scandella said, his voice cracking. "It's too bad that we didn't get the win, but it's a new game today, it's a new day and we're going to come out hard tonight."
Scandella, who recently joined Twitter at @marcoscandella, is trying to raise awareness for men's health through Hockey Fight's Cancer and tweeted a link to auction off a game-worn tie last week.