NHL players who want to complete their college degrees will have a smoother pathway thanks to an agreement announced Wednesday between their union and Boston College.
The deal would ease the way for current and former players to graduate from BC’s Woods College of Advancing Studies, an arm of the university that offers flexible routes to certificates and degrees for non-traditional students. Among the alums: NHL Players Association executive director Marty Walsh.
“It allowed me the opportunity to get a college degree,” the former Boston mayor and U.S. secretary of labor said in an interview with The Associated Press. “I went to school with people that were undergrads, that went to school at BC, taking class at night. And I was [also] in class with people in their 70s. Which is amazing.”
David Goodman, the dean of Woods College, said the agreement is “the next evolution of a relationship that was already there,” by removing “some of the friction” that might have prevented players from going back to school. It will make it easier for potential students to transfer previously earned credits, as one example, he said.
Josh Jooris, who played three years at Union College before earning his first NHL contract with the Calgary Flames, is currently enrolled. Brooks Orpik, who played three years for the Eagles before an NHL career in which he won two Stanley Cup championships with the Pittsburgh Penguins, returned to school after he retired and earned his degree in 2022.
“I had promised a lot of people, including my parents and former BC hockey coach Jerry York, that I would finish college at some point,” Orpik said. “The feeling of pride I had was just so different than anything, athletically, I have accomplished.”
Goodman said the students can study online, on-campus or hybrid. The new agreement doesn’t have a limit on the number of players it can accept, but Goodman said he expects “a couple of dozen”; if there are more, the school would add sections to accommodate them, he said.
The NHLPA agreement with BC comes the same week as the Major League Baseball Players Association announced a similar deal with Syracuse. Walsh said he hadn’t talked to his baseball counterparts about it.
“We all have programs,” said NHLPA head, who needed more than 10 years, taking one or two classes per semester, to get his degree while he was working full-time, including as a member of the Massachusetts House of Representatives.
“We’re a union that represents our workers on the on the ice and through to collective bargaining,” he said. “But we also want to make sure that we’re preparing these players, that when their careers are over, that they’re set up for success going forward, too.”
The NHL says more than a third of its players played college hockey in the U.S. or Canada, with the majority of those leaving school before getting their degrees. Both Woods and Walsh noted that even players who go on to a successful NHL career would likely retire in their 30s, leaving a long worklife ahead of them.
“These players are typically scooped up in their first two years,” Woods said. “When they come back after having been successful, coming back to one’s education is not necessarily a sexy move. But it’s finishing something they once started.”