BROSSARD, Que.— The rehabilitation process from reconstructive knee surgery starts with immobility. For a hockey player, or any professional athlete conditioned to be in perpetual motion, it’s torturous. There is the physical torment of being placed in a leg-locked brace and fitted for crutches, and then there’s the mental anguish of knowing the road to recovery will only begin to become visible several months after days of immobility.

Kirby Dach was 22 years old and moving faster than he ever had when he was stopped in his tracks by a hit that knocked him out of a game and onto a gurney. His collision with Chicago Blackhawks defenceman Jared Tinordi, in October of 2023, saw him suffer tears to the medial collateral and anterior cruciate ligaments of his right knee and exposed him to a gr

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