( Above Photo Credit:  Sportsnet .ca )

By Mark Allred          Follow Me On Twitter @BlackAndGold277

The 2017 Boston Marathon is set to make its 121st appearance this Monday morning with an assortment of festivities to begin the 26-mile event that starts on Main Street in Hopkinton, Massachusetts and ends in Copley Square in the States Capital of Boston. Two members of Boston’s hockey community are teaming up for the annual event to spread Spinal Cord awareness as former National Women’s Hockey League player Denna Laing and former Boston Bruins player Bobby Carpenter are prepared to run the grueling course that so many have participated in since 1897.

The 25-year-old Laing who’s a native of Marblehead, Massachusetts was severely injured on December 31, 2015, in a Women’s Winter Classic game held at Gillette Stadium resulting in her being paralyzed with no feeling from the waist down and limited arm movements after she went into the boards head first in the first period of the mentioned event. Since the unfortunate accident which left her unable to return to the game of hockey, she’s been an inspiration to many who’ve suffered sports related or accidental spinal cord misfortunes.

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Denna had a successful NCAA Women’s hockey career at Princeton University where she appeared in 120 games posting 35-42-77 numbers before she joined the Boston Blades of the Canadian Women’s Hockey League where she had a goal and an assist in 18 games played. When she joined the NWHL’s Boston Pride for the 2015-19 season, she only played in two games before her career ending injury.

Carpenter, a Peabody, Mass. native spent three and a half of his 18 years in the National Hockey League with the Bruins and was a Stanley Cup Champion as a New Jersey Devils player in 1995 and as a coach as well in 2000 and 2003. He’s appeared in 1,178 career NHL games posting 320-408-728 numbers making stops with the Washington Capitals, New York Rangers, Los Angeles Kings, Boston Bruins, and New Jersey Devils.

The now 53-year-old Carpenter was the first ever American-born player selected in the first round of any NHL Entry Draft to go pro straight out of high school after he was picked in 1981. In 2016 Bobby ran the Boston Marathon in three hours and 47 minutes after leaving a job with the Toronto Maple Leafs organization.

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