Victim of racist taunt, Smereck says abuser should be banned from hockey

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After a racist taunt directed at HC Donbass Donetsk defender Jalen Smereck went viral after being filmed, the hockey world is calling for harsh discipline. In a Ukrainian Hockey League game on Sunday, Andrei Denyskin, a HC Krementchuk forward, made the racist gesture towards Smereck, who is black. On Wednesday, the UHL handed Denyskin a 13-game suspension and a fine. Several NHL players have since weighed in on the incident and many in the hockey community want the International Ice Hockey Federation to get involved and impose penalties. TSN Salim Valji reached out to Smereck, 24, in Ukraine on Thursday to discuss the racist incident, Denyskins’ suspension and Smereck’s future in the league.

TSN: How are you feeling? How have you been in the last few days? Smereck: I’m doing pretty well. The first day after the video started streaming it was a little hard to see myself in that situation, and then the first 20, 30 minutes after seeing the suspension, I was heartbroken. But I am really well and quite satisfied. What was your first reaction when you saw the gesture on the ice? I really haven’t seen him too much. My teammate was holding me back because he was fighting another guy, he was throwing him on the ice. I tried to get in there and defend my teammate. Then my other teammate, my partner D, grabbed me and pulled me out. The benches shouted my name. I looked around, saw why they were screaming and tried to figure out what was going on. At the same time, I was trying to tell him to come and fight me fairly. Let’s have a real fight. I kind of only got a glimpse of it, and then I saw it after the game. I was pretty pissed off. What was your reaction to the suspension? It looks like it will be 13 games. I say heartbroken. I was really angry, disappointed. With so much going on in the world, I thought this would be the time to really speak up and show that Ukraine is not a place where this is tolerated. I’ve been through all the good situations here with some really nice people. I just felt like they would definitely make the right choice here.

Were you consulted by the league before granting the suspension? Yes, I spoke with the GM for a few minutes the next morning after it happened.

Did Andrei ask for an apology and have you seen the apology he made on Instagram? He tried after the game, but after losing the game and something like that my teammates told me. I didn’t really know what was going on. The doctor in the hallway was trying to find a translator to tell me he was waiting for me in the hallway. My teammates were like, don’t worry about that. Do not go. He wanted to apologize, but now was not the time to apologize after something like that, especially something so deep. If it was words, maybe yes, we can talk afterwards. But something like that? There are no excuses for this. Are you surprised this incident got as much attention as it did? NHL players weigh heavy, it’s part of the sports news cycle in North America. Is it surprising? Not really. At first it was quite surprising because my phone would ring every 10 seconds, but when you look at what it really did it’s one of the worst times we’ve had in hockey as minorities, as an African American, since the Wayne Simmonds. incident. I just think at a time like this we had all the movement of All Lives Matter, Black Lives Matter, all that crazy stuff, I thought it was really going to explode once it came out.

Did anyone from the NHL, like players or other people, reach out? Yeah, I’ve had a lot of guys actually. JT Brown is one of the first guys, Akim Aliu, the NHL guys started coming. I talk to Clayton Keller quite often and he reached out right away, Max Domi reached out, (Anthony) Duclair reached out. Akim helped me talk to the guys from the Hockey Diversity Alliance program. There have been a lot of guys I’ve played with who are in the NHL now. There have been so many guys. It was unconditional and so much love that I can’t even name all the people who have reached out in the last 48, 72 hours. There are many calls for the International Ice Hockey Federation to step in and administer more severe discipline or to react in a tangible way. What would you like to see the IIHF do? I would hate to say he should be banned, but he should just be banned. There is no other way forward, there is no other way around it. From what I hear, this is the second time. He had an incident in North America, I think the North American League or something like that, so there’s so much flying around right now. I think there is no excuse for this. There were no excuses. The apology he gave on Instagram was really, really bad. I think there is no other solution, just a ban on the whole game. Now what is your relationship with your current team? Your former CEO says he was fired in part for speaking out publicly in support of you and calling for sanctions. What is your relationship with your team at the moment and do you have any idea what your future in sport will be like? My relationship with the team is pretty good. I had a meeting with the head coach the other day. They support me strongly and they always fight against it. We just talked about my return to the ice and my preparation for the Champions Hockey League (European tournament), so it’s my goal for now, to play on Wednesday. I just want to prepare with the team. They have been quite supportive. They posted stuff on social media to let the league know it wasn’t right. I don’t really know what my next stops will be after that. At the moment, my plan is not really to play too much. I would say my future is very, very short with the Ukrainian Hockey League. Considering that we’re playing October 6 and 13 with the Hockey Champions League and have a few UHL games in between, depending on what the staff want me to do, I don’t really want to play in those games but if I do want to play in the Champions League I will probably have to play a few of these games. I’m pretty sure that after the Champions League I won’t play another game in the Ukrainian Hockey League.

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