Forward scored in OT in Game 7 vs. Bruins Just moments after scoring the series-clinching goal in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals against the Boston Bruins on Wednesday night, Capitals forward Joel Ward was the target of racial slurs on Twitter.
Ward is a Canadian raised in Toronto whose parents were originally from Barbados. After he back-handed a rebound past Bruins goalie Tim Thomas at 2:57 of overtime, the tweets started appearing. Dozens of the messages, many graphic in nature and at least one containing a death threat, were saved and aggregated by web sites such as Capitals Outsider, SB Nation and Chirpstory, among others. Many of the tweets have since been deleted. One user apologized for his remark via Twitter and said it had been deleted.
“What these people have said and done is unforgivable. I hope they are now publicly identified and pay a huge price for their beliefs,” Caps owner Ted Leonsis wrote on his personal blog, Ted’s Take. “There should be zero tolerance for this kind of hate mongering. Their messages should now stay glued into the algorithms to place a forever warning and a mark upon these people and their actions. They shouldn’t be able to escape their keystrokes.”
Ward is the only black player on the Capitals and one of 21 black or bi-racial players who ended the 2011-12 regular season in the NHL, a league that has long been sensitive about its lack of diversity.
Last Sept. 22, Philadelphia Flyers winger Wayne Simmonds, a friend of Ward’s who also grew up in Toronto, was about to take a shootout attempt during a preseason game in London, Ontario when a fan threw a banana peel on the ice.
It was impossible to verify how many of the racist tweets Wednesday night were from angry Bruins fans, but the organization still put out a statement denouncing them.
“The Bruins are very disappointed by the racist comments that were made following the game last night,” the organization wrote in a statement. “These classless, ignorant views are in no way a reflection of anyone associated with the Bruins organization.”
Ward, 31, signed a four-year, $12 million contract with Washington last summer in large part because of his postseason heroics with the Nashville Predators last spring when he had seven goals and six assists in 12 playoff games.
“The racially charged comments distributed via digital media following last night’s game were ignorant and unacceptable,” the NHL wrote in an official statement, according to USA Today. “The people responsible for these comments have no place associating themselves with our game.”
