Keegan Kolesar keeps challenging weekend in perspective

What Keegan Kolesar went through last week would have been challenging even if he weren’t sick.

Last Friday, Kolesar and the Wolves arrived in the Des Moines area for a Saturday night game against the Iowa Wild. After getting in, Kolesar got dinner but was battling a cold and went to bed early. Kolesar was up by 8 am Saturday and woke up to see a missed call and text from Vegas general manager Kelly McCrimmon.

When the two connected, McCrimmon told Kolesar he was getting called up to the Golden Knights for that night’s game in Las Vegas but might not play. Kolesar left the hotel, grabbed his gear and went to the airport for a nonstop flight from Des Moines to Las Vegas.

Kolesar stopped briefly at a Las Vegas hotel and took pregame warmups with the Golden Knights but indeed was scratched. He worked out during the game and was told he would be sent back to Chicago. Kolesar got back to his hotel at 11:30 pm Saturday, was awake by 4:45 am Sunday for a 6:30 flight to Chicago, where he landed at 12:15, before going directly to Allstate Arena for Sunday’s 3:10 game with Milwaukee.

And not only did Kolesar play, but he had an assist, three shots and a plus-1 rating against one of the AHL’s best teams.

So this all leads to one question: while sick, how did he do all of that in such a short period of time?

“Honestly, I’m asking myself the same thing,” Kolesar said. “I called my parents after and I said, ‘I don’t know how I made it through that game (Sunday).’”

Before Sunday’s game, Kolesar’s illness was getting to him, which gave him a headache and made it tough for him to breathe out of his nose. But once the game began, a “switch flipped” and he got into the flow after his brief trip to the NHL.

“That call-up was more motivation than anything,” Kolesar said. “You get a little taste of what it’s like to be up there. You want to stay, you want to be around the big club. Once it comes to playing here in a top game like that, there’s no reason to let up.”

Kolesar even said his weekend wasn’t tougher than what his teammates battled.

Kolesar’s Sunday flight to Chicago was in first class and he was able to sleep soundly. Following that Saturday night game in Des Moines, the Wolves bused back and didn’t get in until the middle of the night.

“That’s pretty tough on them,” Kolesar said. “That makes my travel seem a little bit easier.”

In general, last weekend was filled with examples of hockey players being hockey players.

Wolves players didn’t sleep much and some skated with illnesses. Kolesar criss-crossed the continent under the weather. Curtis McKenzie was hit in the face with a puck but missed less than 10 minutes of game time before returning.

“I don’t want to say we’re super-human or anything like that, because there are some things that can bring us down,” Kolesar said. “I think we’re a pretty tough and character team. We don’t let a lot of things bring us down.”