Brock Trotter Leads Pioneer Resurgence

From: St. Cloud Times
by Kevin Allenspach

(left) Brock Trotter

The line of danger in hockey can be as thin as a skate blade. Just ask Denver sophomore Brock Trotter.

Five games and five points into his college career, Trotter skated into the corner after the puck on Oct. 29, 2005, at North Dakota. Towering Sioux defenseman Matt Smaby, now with the Tampa Bay Lightning, stepped on Trotter’s right leg in the process of delivering a check.

Smaby’s skate came down like a guillotine and severed Trotter’s Achilles tendon.

“I was just trying to compose myself and join the play,” Trotter said. “Then I tried to push off and nothing happened. I thought my ankle was broke. I wish it had. That would’ve been a lot better. If that was all, I could’ve been back in a matter of weeks.”

Instead, as North Dakota goalie Jordan Parise looked at Trotter and began frantically waving for the trainer, Trotter was just beginning an ordeal that would consume most of the next year in rehabilitation. He bent over to look at the gash, which was bleeding profusely out of his skate boot, and went into shock.

He was rushed to a Grand Forks hospital, where doctors probed his leg to find the ends of the severed tendon.

“I wasn’t going to be able to tolerate that, so they put me under,” Trotter said. “Next thing I know, I woke up and they’d already done the surgery.

“They said I was lucky, because a fraction of an inch in a different direction and my career would’ve been over,” added Trotter, who stressed that his injury was an accident. “I don’t know how lucky I felt walking on crutches or sitting in a wheelchair.”

He wondered whether he’d play again or, if he did, whether he’d attain the level he expected to achieve. Trotter scored 63 points in 64 USHL games after he was an all-star in the Manitoba Junior Hockey League and was one of the top teen prospects in Western Canada.

Two years later, he’s as good as ever. His first goal after finally getting back in uniform came early in his first game in St. Cloud, when the Pioneers beat the Huskies 4-3 in overtime Oct. 13, 2006. Trotter became the first freshman to lead DU in scoring in 20 years, leads the Pioneers with 15 points this season, and is their active career scoring leader with 60 in 59 games.

When he pulls on his socks for tonight’s game between the Nos. 4-5 Pioneers and 14th-ranked St. Cloud State at the National Hockey Center, he’ll cover up an ugly scar on the back of his right ankle. It’s a reminder of why he had to redshirt in 2005-06, and evidence of how close he might’ve come to never playing again.

“It was gruesome what he went through,” said Huskies junior John Swanson, who lived four blocks away from Trotter when they were junior teammates in Lincoln, Neb., and spent a lot of time together. “Last time I saw him, we talked about how his foot was doing and he seems to be doing good. He’s a good playmaker. He’s like (SCSU’s Ryan) Lasch.”

Trotter, who is from Brandon, Manitoba, and expects several family members at the games this weekend, has tied career bests with three-point games twice this season. He’s the leader of an offense that has featured 37 of 40 goals scored by freshmen or sophomores.

“We’re all trying to push Brock to be a point-and-a-half- or two-point-a-game guy,” Denver coach George Gwozdecky said. “He’s capable of it. He’s got tremendous eye-hand coordination ... I’ve seen him get better because he’s a persistent, tough young guy. He’s a threat offensively, but he gives us good checking pressure. He’s resilient. I think when something you value so much is almost taken away, it makes you more appreciative of it when you get it back.”