Controversial Workout Leaves ASU's Matthew Mayich's Future in Jeopardy
A new video shows the moments before Arizona State hockey player Matthew Mayich collapsed during a controversial outdoor team workout last month, leaving him in the hospital with “zero chance of recovery.” The video, obtained and published by Arizona’s Family on Tuesday, September 22, features Green Beret Tim Ziesel running the workout on the field outside ASU’s ice rink on August 20. “Those teams that have won, they’re soft,” Ziesel can be heard telling the players as they performed planks on the ground. “Because that’s what winning does to you. It makes you soft!” Ziesel then commanded the players to perform push-ups, with some of the players noticeably struggling.
Shortly after the video was taken, Mayich, 21, collapsed due to a heat stroke. In an exclusive interview with Us earlier this month, the Mayich family’s attorney, Robert Carey, acknowledged “no good outcome is coming.” A report issued by Arizona State University on Tuesday revealed temperatures at the time of the workout “ranged from 86 degrees to 89 degrees F with a relative humidity of 51 percent to 46 percent.” https://www.instagram.com/reel/DdnTEDwHeIJ/?stkn=MWhzOWk3NDkzazZydQ%3D%3D During the workout, Mayich became dizzy and disoriented before suffering “exertional heat stroke that caused a lack of oxygen to the brain,” according to Carey. The attorney told Us he’s “confident” Mayich did not receive water throughout the nearly-hour long workout, which ASU’s report refuted. “ASU Hockey staff ordered short-sleeved, light-colored shirts for them to wear with shorts during the event, and the athletic trainer brought water for the student-athletes to drink as well as a cooler with iced towels,” the report said. ”A break was taken approximately 20 minutes into the event for the student-athletes to drink water.” James Rund, ASU’s Senior Vice President, Educational Outreach and Student Services, added in the report, “All of the student-athletes who participated in the event had been medically cleared for athletics participation prior to the event. This included Matthew, who had arrived in Tempe from his home in Canada eight days earlier (on August 12) and been medically cleared by the team physician and the athletic trainer after a pre-participation physical examination.” Despite the alleged precautions, the report acknowledged the ASU hockey team “did not submit a plan of training activities for review by ASU’s strength and conditioning coaches prior to the event.”
The Mayich family attorney issued a blistering response about the report to Us on Wednesday. “What the report doesn’t say is what the players will tell you: this was a punishment workout,” Carey said. “Miss a count, your group runs again. The head coach set it up, stood there and watched it, and didn’t stop it when the signs were there. And when Matthew went down, there was no plan and no preparation, so he was treated in a way that hurt his chances rather than helped them.” The lawyer continued, “The report does settle one thing. The coach said the workout was planned for ninety minutes and cut short at forty-five. ASU’s own timeline has Matthew on that field for more than eighty minutes, in a grueling workout with almost no water, with no acclimation to anything like it, eight days off a plane from Canada, and nobody doing their job on safety or ready for an emergency.” Arizona State is scheduled to open the season on October 2 at Lindenwood.
