For the second year in a row, Aberdeen hockey player John Laursen summoned players to his charity game – Play for a Purpose – to the Gardens Ice House in Laurel, Md.
This time around, the player who originally inspired it got to play.
Back in December of 2018, 13-year-old Divyne Apollon II and his travel team, the Maryland Maple Leafs, played a game against a team from Pennsylvania, which turned violent after opposing players directed ‘monkey sounds’ and other taunts at him. Apollon, who is Black, was suspended from the game for fighting.