Post by Atko on Nov 26, 2004 19:03:43 GMT
(CP) - Dan Sullivan won't be dropping his drawers during a hockey game again any time soon.
Mooning fans in Wheeling, W.Va., has cost the cheeky right-winger a 12-game ECHL suspension and a job with the Reading Royals. "It's unfortunate that it happened but he made a mistake and now he has to pay the price," Reading coach Derek Clancey said after the league announced the suspension Thursday. "He has to accept accountability for his actions."
Sullivan, 23, has returned to his family's home in Toronto and won't play for the Royals again, said Clancey.
The league cited "multiple obscene gestures" by Sullivan during a Nov. 7 game as the reason for the suspension and a fine of an undisclosed amount.
Sullivan wasn't even in the Royals' lineup against the Wheeling Nailers that night because he was injured.
There is no place in WesBanco Arena for players in street clothes to sit other than in the stands. The two teams were in the midst of three consecutive meetings in the city and emotions were running high as Sullivan and teammates Reagan Rome and Larry Courville watched.
Rome, a defenceman from Nesbitt, Man., was starting a two-game suspension for leaving the bench to join an altercation the previous night, when Courville, a left-winger from Timmins, Ont., who once skated for the NHL's Vancouver Canucks, suffered a concussion when he was punched in the face by the much larger T.J. Reynolds of Kitchener, Ont.
Fans recognized them sitting together during the Nov. 7 game.
"(Courville) was being taunted in a very disgraceful manner by fans," said Clancey. "They were picking on him.
"(Sullivan) was trying to defend a teammate, which was great - but not the way he ended up doing it."
During the third period of the game, won 5-0 by the Royals on a Sunday, the six-foot-two, 225-pound Sullivan lowered his pants and mooned spectators.
"Sundays are our family crowds with our kids," co-owner Rob Brooks told the Reading Eagle at the time. "Gestures like that really aren't appropriate for our league."
Reading suspended Sullivan indefinitely.
"We insist that our athletes adhere to very professional levels of conduct and that all their actions represent this organization with class and dignity," Royals GM Ray Delia said in a statement.
Mooning fans in Wheeling, W.Va., has cost the cheeky right-winger a 12-game ECHL suspension and a job with the Reading Royals. "It's unfortunate that it happened but he made a mistake and now he has to pay the price," Reading coach Derek Clancey said after the league announced the suspension Thursday. "He has to accept accountability for his actions."
Sullivan, 23, has returned to his family's home in Toronto and won't play for the Royals again, said Clancey.
The league cited "multiple obscene gestures" by Sullivan during a Nov. 7 game as the reason for the suspension and a fine of an undisclosed amount.
Sullivan wasn't even in the Royals' lineup against the Wheeling Nailers that night because he was injured.
There is no place in WesBanco Arena for players in street clothes to sit other than in the stands. The two teams were in the midst of three consecutive meetings in the city and emotions were running high as Sullivan and teammates Reagan Rome and Larry Courville watched.
Rome, a defenceman from Nesbitt, Man., was starting a two-game suspension for leaving the bench to join an altercation the previous night, when Courville, a left-winger from Timmins, Ont., who once skated for the NHL's Vancouver Canucks, suffered a concussion when he was punched in the face by the much larger T.J. Reynolds of Kitchener, Ont.
Fans recognized them sitting together during the Nov. 7 game.
"(Courville) was being taunted in a very disgraceful manner by fans," said Clancey. "They were picking on him.
"(Sullivan) was trying to defend a teammate, which was great - but not the way he ended up doing it."
During the third period of the game, won 5-0 by the Royals on a Sunday, the six-foot-two, 225-pound Sullivan lowered his pants and mooned spectators.
"Sundays are our family crowds with our kids," co-owner Rob Brooks told the Reading Eagle at the time. "Gestures like that really aren't appropriate for our league."
Reading suspended Sullivan indefinitely.
"We insist that our athletes adhere to very professional levels of conduct and that all their actions represent this organization with class and dignity," Royals GM Ray Delia said in a statement.
, he'd be out for years.... 
