HOCKEY

And Dawg Nation isn’t nished either. ere is a bigger goal still on the horizon: a $64 million arena with three sheets of ice that anyone — disabled or not — can access. It would be one of the only facilities like it in the country. is is still years in the making, but the group is determined to see it through.

A place where Dawg Nation can call home. Where players can go to escape the hard times and enjoy the game that brings them all together. Somewhere where people like Richardson and Donnelly can go to positively a ect the lives of hundreds who need to be uplifted.

As of February, Donnelly was moved up to number one on the heart transplants list.

For a month and a half, all he could do was wait with the Dawg Nation family behind him. In April, he got the call he was waiting for. e next morning he was in the hospital. Donnelly got his heart.

“I can’t wait to slide him the puck and watch that one-timer hit the back of the net for the rst time with his new heart,” Richardson said with a smile.

For more information about Dawg Nation and how you can help, visit https://www.dawgnation.org/ . is story via University of Colorado Boulder News Corps, part of a collaboration in spring of 2023 with Colorado Community Media.