COLUMBUS, Ohio — Jane Poynter cannot advise Sidney Crosby on how to beat the Canadiens' Carey Price top shelf or remain out of Tom Wilson’s crosshairs should the Penguins and Capitals meet again in the Stanley Cup playoffs.
But Poynter, an aerospace executive who spent two years locked inside a hermetically sealed, three-acre bubble, is well schooled in the mental challenges awaiting Crosby and the Penguins this summer in a tournament that will isolate its participants to guard against the spread of COVID-19.
Under normal circumstances, the veteran Penguins would be ready for any issue arising during a long playoff run. What they and other teams will encounter in terms of restricted access to families and the outside world, however, is unprecedented.
Three decades ago, Poynter and fellow scientific researchers faced numerous hardships working inside Biosphere 2, an artificial ecosystem in the Arizona desert. While she believes pro athletes can adapt to life behind the virtual walls of a makeshift village, an extended stay won’t be without social perils.
Teams reaching the championship round could spend more than two months inside the enclosed environs in Toronto and Edmonton, the hub cities reportedly chosen for the conference tournaments. Confined quarters can turn friends into a group of bickering Brad Marchand types at a time of year when team morale and chemistry are most important.
“What really tends to happen is people start acting out,” Poynter said. “That’s the kind of stuff that can happen fairly quickly to people not used to being in environments where they can’t come and go as they please. People can make mountains out of molehills and molehills out of mountains. We were inside for two years, but we started squabbling after two or three weeks. We weren’t trained for this just like these players aren’t trained for this. It’s a different world.”
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Jane Poynter - AP[/caption]
Poynter isn’t alone in that opinion.
“You think you could handle anything for two weeks,” said Kai Staats, who spent a fortnight isolated with five others in the Mars Desert Research Station in Utah. “But there were arguments, there were fights, there were breakups of friendships that took significant time to kind of repair.”
Player safety has been the focal point since the NHL, NBA and Major League Soccer announced intentions to resume seasons halted by the pandemic in March. Most discussions have centered on frequent testing and taking extreme measures to ensure physical health. But several experts in the field of isolation told DK Pittsburgh Sports psychological factors cannot be ignored.
Nobody questions the toughness of multi-Cup winners such as Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang and Patric Hornqvist. They have no training, however, in dealing with life inside a bubble, where any decision to step outside could expose them and teammates to the virus.
Experts said teams must make mental-health advisors available for players and coaches struggling with the exceptional circumstances. Participants also must find ways to unwind during down time with limited options.
“That will be crucial,” said John Adams, a deputy director of Biosphere 2, which is now open to the public in Oracle, Ariz. “People see psychologists all the time. Given this added stressor, which is not one many of us are familiar with, having someone to help you cope will be vital. We know athletes have the skill and the God-given gifts to do what they do. But we also know a big percentage of one’s performance is based on what’s going on between the ears.”
'BIOLOGY IS SELFISH'
The Penguins have not addressed mental-health factors in teleconferences with the media ahead of the start of training camp, which is tentatively set to begin July 10 at their practice facility. But it’s hard to imagine these issues have not been broached internally.
Several NHL players have expressed concerns about competing, while some in other sports already have stated their intent to sit out because of virus-based fears. Mike Sullivan said Wednesday none of his players have voiced worry about playing through the pandemic.
A team psychologist for the Blue Jackets has been providing material to players and coaches since the NHL “paused” the season in mid-March, said general manager Jarmo Kekalainen. The Blue Jackets have given their staff the ability to opt out without losing pay if members don’t feel comfortable participating.
“The mental side of it is something that will have to be a big part of our preparation,” Kekalainen told DK Pittsburgh Sports. “There’s an understanding of the discipline it will take, the mental strength it will take from everybody. It’s a situation where one player’s undisciplined act or not following the rules could cost the whole team. That’s one thing. The other part is keeping the team as a whole as strong as possible. … From the mental-health point of view, guys are going to have to be away from their families, have to be in a bubble, be separated from the rest of the world basically. We need to prepare for that.”
Kekalainen raised a point that’s already come under question. Can pro athletes, risk-takers by nature, follow the rules designed to keep them safe? Will they sneak off campus to meet with friends or party in clubs outside designated areas?
The NBA and MLS are conducting their tournaments at the Disney World complex in Florida, a state where the virus is surging. NBA players who leave their Orlando hamlet can expect to be quarantined for a minimum of 10 days and to have to produce two negative tests to return to action, according to a report from The Athletic.
The Penguins are one of 12 Eastern Conference teams likely to play in Toronto. The Athletic reported plans for a 40-acre village on the grounds of Exhibition Place, which includes the OVO Athletic Centre, Coca-Cola Coliseum and the 404-room Hotel X. The district includes restaurants, food trucks, theaters and workout facilities so players don’t feel like jurors being sequestered in the hotel between games and practices.
Tournament plans remain fluid. Some players have heard families might be permitted visits in the later rounds.
But will the accommodations be enough to keep the teams’ traveling parties, expected to number 50 members for each squad, from venturing outside the safety zone?
“When you take these players who are wealthy and typically able to do what they want to do -- and I’m not saying that as a negative -- and you start putting restrictions on them … there are going to be reactions,” said Staats, a visiting researcher for Northwestern University and the University of Arizona. “There are going to be changes in behavior that we may not be able to predict.
“Biology is selfish at its very functional DNA level. Every biological organism will react when its sustenance or availability of resources is restricted.”
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Inside a chamber of Biosphere 2 in Oracle, Ariz. - AP[/caption]
GOING OFFLINE
Nick Kanus, an emeritus professor of psychiatry at the University of California-San Francisco, tells a story that sounds lifted from the lyrics of Elton John’s “Rocket Man.”
The professor has spent five decades studying the behaviors of astronauts aboard space stations and researchers working in isolated regions such as the South Pole. Kanus said homesick space travelers often calm themselves by visiting the ship’s cupola to gaze at the Earth.
“The No. 1 positive experience is seeing our planet,” said Kanus, author of Humans in Space: The Psychological Hurdles. “It’s not religion. It’s not maintaining rocket ships. It’s seeing the Earth in all of its beauty, and understanding there are no barriers. Space is pretty black and white and isolated. Seeing the Earth reminds you there are family and friends down below.”
Matt Murray and Tristan Jarry aren’t going to tape posters of our planet to the walls of their hotel rooms. But with so much time spent in so little space, isolation experts said players will need to find constructive ways and habits to fill the hours.
Unlike the Pirates, who will travel regionally for their abbreviated 60-game regular season, the sights and experiences won’t change much for the Penguins. And the more rounds NHL and NBA teams win, the longer their stay.
Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka recently shared an anecdote on a conference call about the personal sacrifices being made to chase a title. He said his 10-year-old daughter, Emery, has been moved to tears at the dinner table with thoughts of her father being away for up to three months.
“I think Orlando itself is going to be as much of a mental test as it is a physical test just because of the extraordinary circumstances there," Pelinka told reporters.
The Lakers have “put a ton of thought into the mental part of this journey,” he added. Unconventional activities such as yoga and meditation are under consideration.
“Just keeping guys fresh, keeping life interesting," Pelinka said. "Keeping everyone's passions sharpened …”
The misadventures of the Biosphere 2 project serve as a cautionary tale. In 1991, the eight crew members (four men, four women) entered the glass-enclosed structure as friends who had experienced isolation at sea and the Australian outback. In a two-year span, factions formed and relationships unraveled.
The crew had plenty of space to roam and work to occupy their thoughts in what Poynter described as a “new-age Garden of Eden.” There was a miniature rain forest, savannah, desert, ocean and marsh. Loads of plants, insects and animals. However, diminishing oxygen levels and food supplies jeopardized a mission meant to replicate a future space colony. Poynter briefly left the bubble after severing the tip of a finger in a wheat-threshing accident.
Pro hockey and basketball players won’t face such dangers, but all championship teams must overcome adversity on the way to raising trophies.
Poynter said the advent of FaceTime and Zoom calls will make time away from loved ones easier to manage. Still, she anticipates challenges.
“In our everyday lives, we are bombarded by stimuli that are coming in from the outside,” Poynter said. “I’m sure these athletes have enormous input coming in from outside environments and those stimuli, one would assume, will be vastly reduced. That’s a big deal.”
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Sidney Crosby steps on the ice Wednesday in Cranberry. - PITTSBURGH PENGUINS[/caption]
Staats agrees that connecting with family is important, but he thinks the Penguins should limit their time online and scanning social media.
"Being isolated, the natural reaction is to hyper-connect with everybody else — more text messages, more WhatsApp, more Facebook, more Twitter,” he said. “Yet, we know — and it’s proven today —that the millennial generation, for instance, is the most isolated and depressed generation in history. Social media does not compensate. What’s happening is people are not learning to be on their own. They don’t know what it means to be ‘OK with themselves.’
“Bear with me because this is going to sound like touchy-feely, 1960s hippie psychology. But the reality is the generations today do not know what it means to be alone and yet they are the most lonely of any generation.”
Staats lives in the ghost town of Cascabel, Ariz. The nearest city is 45 minutes away. His closest neighbors are bear, javelina, turkey, deer and hawks. The lifestyle is not for everyone, but he finds joy in getting offline, getting outdoors and getting away from the stress of work.
He and others believe it will be imperative for coaches and team leaders to recognize players who need a mental break from playoff pressures when outside options are few.
“When you know your boundaries are restricted, whether you are told you can’t leave a certain area or you physically aren’t able to leave that area, it changes the dynamics of those people within the confines,” Staats said. “I can’t tell you why, but I have experienced it in several ways.
“There’s nothing wrong with putting down the cell phone and not spending hours of free time watching YouTube videos.”
As the Penguins pursue a sixth Cup, maybe there’s wisdom to be gleaned from touchy-feely, 1960s hippie psychology.
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