Hes not done healing: Surviving the devastating Humboldt Broncos crash was just the beginni

Carley Matechuk pinballed down endless Saskatchewan highways, unsure how to reach her little brother on that frantic, weightless night.

Hours after the crash, there was still little clarity from the site of the tragedy or the hospital in Nipawin, where the Humboldt Broncos had been heading for a playoff game earlier that Friday evening.

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She received sporadic calls from her parents, piecing together information from the families who were already there, slowly learning about the living and the dead.

Carley wasn’t sure where to go to find Layne. Would the survivors remain in Nipawin or be flown to trauma centers in Saskatoon or Regina? It wasn’t even certain that he was still alive. But she believed he was. He had to be.

Despite the four years between them, Layne was her closest friend. They were connected in ways that few people share. If he was gone, she would know — she was certain — because part of her would be gone too.

Growing up in Colonsay, a rural speck on the Trans-Canada Highway system, less than an hour east of Saskatoon, they spent seasons outdoors — winters, sledding and skating, summers camping beneath the stars. But a shared love of hockey was their bond. They watched the Mighty Ducks together, the originals and all the sequels, over and over. And NHL games each weekend. Carley cheered for the Washington Capitals and Alex Ovechkin; Layne idolized Sidney Crosby and the Penguins.

She loved watching the game from above, Layne loved it from the ice. And from those stands, Carley had always been Layne’s biggest fan — from the moment he learned to skate until he left home to pursue his hockey dreams as a smooth-skating defensemen with a booming slapshot.

They spent hours at the local rink, as Layne excelled through minor hockey, coached by his father. And as he grew in size and talent, and advanced to more competitive teams — bantam in Humboldt, midget in Prince Albert — Carley did all she could to watch her little brother play. She proudly posted images of the two of them together on Instagram each April 10, national sibling day.

When Layne returned to Humboldt in October 2017 to join the Broncos in the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League, Carley made her university roommates in Regina listen to each game on the radio, called by the Broncos young broadcaster Tyler Bieber.

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It had been a tough journey to get there. A concussion had sidelined Layne a year earlier, jeopardizing his ability to play.

Bob Wilke, a mentor in the game, had encouraged Layne through his frustration. Before playing pro for more than a decade, Wilke had survived the Swift Current Broncos bus crash in 1986 — which killed four of his teammates. After suffering from substance abuse for years while trying to cope with the trauma of that tragedy, Wilke had become a leader in mental health advocacy working specifically with young athletes like Layne. Wilke told him about a simple saying that had helped keep him focused through tough times: “Positive Mental Attitude.” The reminder helped keep Layne upbeat and driven. He wrote the acronym PMA on the index finger of his hockey glove, so each time he looked down he’d see the letters.

“That should be our tattoo,” Carley told her brother when she saw it, back in May 2017.

The siblings had always planned to get matching ink. The saying was perfect for them — a way to remember that no matter what obstacles life brought, they’d always be connected.

They scribbled the letters out for each other. Layne’s handwriting was etched onto Carley’s right forearm. He did the same with hers.

Less than a year later, on April 6, 2018 — a frigid, blue-sky day — a transport truck barreled through a stop sign and collided with a bus carrying the Humboldt Broncos junior hockey team.

And Carley raced north from Regina, not sure where the road would lead.  She just had to be closer to Layne.

It’d been more than three hours since the crash. The sun set on the prairies. Her father called. There was confusion at the hospital in identifying the victims, Kevin Matechuk told his daughter — each player with bleached hair and in similar pregame attire. But a nurse caring for the victims found three letters on the right forearm of one of the unnamed.

With conflicting reports in the chaos, the first responders at the crash site didn’t know how many people were on the bus, so they kept searching for bodies in the snow, amongst the twisted metal, scattered clothing, hockey gear and peat moss. When it seemed as though each soul had been counted, a shoe moved. They found Layne face down, beneath the bus roof.

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The Matechuks didn’t see Layne at Royal University Hospital in Saskatoon, where he’d been airlifted, until the middle of the night, after waiting for hours at a table with their name written on it in the cafeteria next to the ICU, alongside other Broncos families waiting to learn the fate of their loved ones.

He’d suffered serious facial fractures and a broken sternum. Both of his lungs collapsed. But a traumatic brain injury was the most concerning.

As his family gathered around him, they tried to process the reality of what occurred. He looked like himself from the neck down, Carley says. She and her mother commented on his hockey feet, which looked the same. They smiled at his blond hair. The tattoo: “PMA,” always. But they took no photos, never wanting Layne to see himself as he was there. They wanted no memory of this moment. They stayed together, beside him, filled with hope. Layne was alive — and in the wake of April 6, 2018, life itself seemed like a miracle.

Sixteen lives were lost in the tragedy. There were 13 survivors, lives forever altered. Support poured in from beyond the hospital walls — from across Canada, the United States, and around the globe. But it was impossible to process just how deeply the tragedy had affected complete strangers, people who knew what it was like to travel with a team, toward simple, carefree dreams.

As the outside world spun forward, Layne remained in a coma for a month and a half. The Matechuk family remained in that moment, beside Layne, waiting.

“It was just day to day, basically just keeping him alive,” says Shelley, his mom.

The brain injury was so severe that the experts working with Layne told his family that they simply couldn’t know what to expect.

“It’s not like breaking an arm,” Kevin says. “It’s the most complicated thing.”

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As the weeks went on, Carley held his hand and told him she was there.  And though unconscious, he squeezed back gently. She felt relief — confident that her brother would be back. She couldn’t wait to hear his voice again.

When Layne first opened his eyes, there was no recognition behind them. He carried a blank stare. But the milestones came quickly. Learning how to swallow. Learning to walk. Regaining mobility. Nobody at Royal University Hospital in Saskatoon, where he spent those first three months, could believe how quickly Layne was back on his feet, moving forward. An audience gathered every time he took a step.

Kevin and Shelley spent more than 15 hours a day at the hospital through those early months. They rented a condo in Saskatoon so they could be beside him when he went to sleep each night and before he woke each morning.

The muscle memory returned more rapidly than his cognitive function. Layne couldn’t use his voice for several months. When it returned, he had to relearn how to talk. At first Layne didn’t like to try, except with his older sister. He’d always find his voice for Carley. She’d returned to Regina then — and so Layne would have his parents call her, constantly, just so he could hear her. She’d talk and talk about anything, and he’d mumble back, searching for words he couldn’t form.

Layne went through speech therapy, learning to form sounds again. Half a year after the crash, he was using simple phrases. Eventually he was able to ask questions.

At that six-month mark, Layne was well enough to be released from the hospital.

Each milestone brought a clearer reflection of who Layne had been before the crash — the gentle, funny young man who did 100 bench press reps each night and hoped to become a chiropractor one day.

Navigating a foreign world, they still had little understanding of the uncertain reality they faced together.

Layne stepped onto the ice and took a stride forward. He swayed, finding the balance between weak legs and the skates beneath him. He held his stick in his left hand, his right raised to the side, as though braced by an invisible wall. He took long, deliberate strides toward the blue line as the rhythm of the glide returned, that familiar near-flight feeling — picking up momentum as he crossed center-ice.

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He smiled wide enough for his father, standing on the sidelines, to see.

It was a return to one of the rinks Layne had spent so much of his childhood playing and dreaming in. A return that seemed impossible just nine months earlier, when their world stopped.

It was another small miracle in Layne’s recovery. Getting back on the ice had been one of his biggest goals. Carley watched the footage her father sent her with a rush of joy and sadness — an awe for what he’d just achieved, grappling with the loss of what he could once do on the ice.

“It was just all the emotions at once,” she says.

At the time, Layne was still living in the condo in Saskatoon, under the constant care of his parents. His two biggest loves were hockey and family, Carley says. He had both.

That March, the Matechuks flew to Pittsburgh to meet Sidney Crosby, who presented Layne with his high school diploma. He’d missed his convocation while he was in the hospital. Layne followed Crosby through the Penguins locker room, without shoes on — as though he was just another one of the guys — and talked about the kind of sticks and skates they both like to use. Crosby gave him a jersey and stick.

“It was so cool,” Layne says. “Me and Crosby talked like best friends.”

A year after the crash, in April 2019, Layne returned home to Colonsay. Shelley had left her job at a local manufacturing shop to take care of him. Kevin worked reduced part-time hours managing the agricultural retail center he’d been with for more than 30 years.

Layne’s remarkable achievements brought hope — each milestone another step in Layne getting closer to where he’d been.

As the public followed his story, many people reached out with information about therapy and rehabilitation. Kevin spent hours researching any promising information and reached out directly to experts, seeking their advice.

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“It feels good knowing there is kindness in the world and people genuinely want to help,” Kevin says. “A lot of that pushed us to keep looking, finding different treatments for him. You know a lot of people say Layne is an inspiration — but having this positive feedback inspires us too.”

Away from the hospital, Layne went through rounds of physiotherapy, eye therapy and speech therapy. They traveled to Winnipeg where Layne saw a specialist, twice spending a week there. They went to Regina to another wellness center, where two other survivors of the crash were seeking therapy. Layne did strength training. He worked through apps on his phone designed to stimulate his cognitive ability. He did exercises to address the gait in his walk whenever he was fatigued — to be able to better use his right side, his dominant hand, which had been particularly affected in the crash.

“It’s been difficult,” Layne says.

Another avenue for hope opened when a representative from the Surrey Neuroplasticity Clinic, near Vancouver, contacted Kevin to tell him about portable neuromodulation stimulator technology, known as the PONS device. Worn during exercise, the device lays on the user’s tongue, stimulating nerve endings, which is believed to help restore lost function.

In November 2021, the Matechuks traveled to British Columbia to see if therapy with the PONS device would benefit Layne. They were there for 2 1/2 weeks, as Layne worked with Mathieu Gagnon, a kinesiologist from the clinic.  It was an intensive process. It is believed to help with balance and gait, specifically. Layne did stability exercises with his eyes closed, like standing on a single leg.

“He’s an absolute workhorse,” says Gagnon. “When it comes down to his rehab and his work ethic, you could see that he was still a very high-level athlete. He’s got a fighting spirit; he’s not going to give up. I think that that’s going to help them get him back to where he wants to be.”

Layne went to a rink and used the device while skating and taking slap shots. He returned to Colonsay with a bunch of “homework” for the next three months — working through therapy sessions and a regime of exercises using the PONS device, on and off the ice, with regular Zoom calls with Gagnon to track progress.

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“I really do think it has helped me,” Layne says. “I feel so much better.”

After completing the 14-week program, Kevin clocked Layne skating across the ice in Colonsay. His lap was three times faster than it’d been the previous year. His gait has improved too, Shelley says. His right side appears to be much stronger.

“From where we started out on April 6, it’s kind of amazing,” Shelley says. “Just to see how well he’s come along. We’re still looking for new ways and new things to try. He’s not done healing yet.”

Carley didn’t process the reality of their “new normal” until the second Christmas after the crash.

Layne’s rapid progress through that first year had proven much of the doubtful prognosis wrong. Hope grew with each remarkable milestone. But as time went on, those milestones started to occur further and further apart. Although each accomplishment brought great pride, it also underscored the unsettling reality of the endless quest for her brother as she’d known him.

Layne would never be quite the same as she remembered in all those happy memories. Looking back to those hopeful months after the crash, as Layne started to return — she now saw naivety about what a traumatic brain injury really looked like.

“I was always looking forward to the old Layne, not realizing that was not coming back,” she says.

Carley had longed to hear his voice, to see him walk, to see him skate, to see him shoot a puck bar-down — to see him smile, and joke and laugh like they used to. She had all of that now and cherished it more than anything. But the joy of that sustained connection will always carry heartbreak. It’s a realization the entire family still grapples with, four years into that endless night.

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“It’s amazing to watch the work that he puts in,” Carley says. “And we do see glimpses of his old self, but it’s also just appreciating who he is now. … You grieve the life that you thought we’d have together, but also understand that we do have a life together. It’s just not exactly what we thought it was going to look like.”

Carley remains her little brother’s biggest fan.

“She’s my best friend,” Layne says.

They still speak every day. They still spend summers on the water at the family cabin. They still debate over Crosby and Ovechkin.

The tattoos still match: “PMA.”  Those letters still connect and define them.

And every April 6, they find some way to be together as a family, grateful for the chance — and thinking of those who no longer can.

When they get to the rink, Carley still loves the game from above, while Layne chases new dreams below. If you watch enough hockey, she says, you can recognize a player just by the way they move on the ice. Carley can see traces of the past in the way Layne moves today — flickers of that smooth, second-nature rhythm as he stickhandles forward, finding the balance in each stride toward the goal.

Recently, Layne returned to the rink in Colonsay as coach of a local men’s beer league team. More than anything, Kevin says, Layne has missed the camaraderie of being part of a team.

The men on the local squad are much older than Layne, who is now 22. But they connect with him in a way that seems difficult for people his own age, people who knew him before.

Though none of the players on the team are as good as Layne once was, he hopes, one day, to be able to play alongside them.

Layne laughs.

“The team’s name is the Colonsay Limp Sticks,” he says. “I coach them three times a week. They kind of suck — so I will be good out there.”

He pauses.

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“It would be kind of nice to be part of a team,” he says.

“Do you think it’s possible?” his father asks.

Layne smiles wide.

“I think it is possible,” he says.

(Top photo: Darryl Dyck / Imago/ZUMA Press)

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