Blades' Lukin out for using cocaine (2024)

Reports claim 23-year-old banned by Canadian league after testing positive for cocaine

By Andy Kent

Florida Everblades rookie forward Jarret Lukin's future with the ECHL team is in jeopardy after news of his standing with the governing body of college athletics in Canada came to light Friday.

According to an article published by multiple publications on the Internet, the 23-year-old Lukin has been handed a two-year ban by the CIS (Canadian Interuniversity Sport) and the CCES (Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sports) after testing positive for cocaine. The University of Calgary suspended Lukin from the team on Nov. 28 after being informed of the positive test.

On Friday afternoon, the ECHL suspended Lukin indefinitely to "investigate an off-ice incident."

Lukin was sent back to his apartment before Friday night's game and instructed not to speak to the media, but he did talk to The Canadian Press.

"It was a mistake off the ice," Lukin told The Canadian Press. "It's been dealt with and I'm dealing with it now from a media perspective. I'm just looking to move on and put it behind me."

"Obviously I'm responsible for my actions," he added. "I don't really want to comment on specifics, but it was a mistake. That's not the guy I am. I've already learned from it. It's just tough. But I've been dealing with it, I've got a good support group and I just hope to be a better person from it."

Everblades team president and general manager Craig Brush said he turned the matter over to the league, and Brian McKenna, ECHL commissioner, confirmed the suspension.

"He'll stay here until they complete the investigation but he can't practice or play with the team," Brush said prior to Friday night's game. "We do not have a drug testing policy in the league, so this is something that will have to be worked out between the league and the players' union, the PHPA (Professional Hockey Players Association)."

Brush reiterated that he was not aware of Lukin's suspension or the test results when he signed him, saying he was of the belief that Lukin wanted to leave school and turn pro. Lukin declined comment when asked by The Canadian Press why Brush did not learn of the positive result until Friday.

According to one of the articles, Lukin, who is only the fourth CIS hockey player to test positive for a banned substance since the CIS began testing in 1990, appealed the ruling and appeared before a doping tribunal on Jan. 31 to ask for a reduction in penalties. He explained that he did not use cocaine to enhance his performance, but an arbitrator upheld the suspension.

"I tried to fight it in that sense ? I wasn't cheating," Lukin told The Canadian Press. "And they obviously gave me the two years."

"I knew it was on the list (of prohibited substances)," he added. "I just got caught at the wrong place at the wrong time and I made a bad decision."

Florida officially signed Lukin on Jan. 29 and in three games he had a goal and an assist. In his 39 games with Calgary last season he had 39 points (9 goals, 30 assists). Lukin spent the previous five years in juniors, four-and-a-half of them with the Western Hockey League's Kamloops Blazers.

He ended 2004-05 with the Medicine Hat Tigers, where he had 16 points (7 goals, 9 assists) in 26 games. Lukin's best season was in 2002-03, when he scored 74 points (32 goals, 42 assists) in 65 regular-season games.

"You never like to see a player go through this type of circ*mstance, that is obviously a mistake (on Lukin's part)," WHL commissioner Ron Robison told the Medicine Hat News. Robison committed his league to install a similar drug testing policy to that of the CIS this season.

Lukin was one of four Everblades players to have appeared on the popular Canadian reality television show, "Making The Cut: Last Man Standing," where 36 players competed for a $250,000 NHL contract. Fellow rookies David Brine, Franklin MacDonald and Adam Taylor were the others.

On the show, Lukin and Taylor quickly became the resident pranksters and favorites of one of the camera crews for their antics, but in this case his apparent lapse in judgment cost him and impacted his family back in Canada as well.

"Me and Luks are good friends, I've known him since I was 14 years old, so it's something that happened to him, he made a mistake and he just wants to get over it and make a fresh start,'' Taylor said after Friday night's 5-3 win over Pensacola. "I know back in Canada they're making a big deal out of it, but he just wants to get back to playing hockey and he's just waiting to see what happens with our league.

"I'll vouch for that guy any day, I'll go to battle for him because I know what kind of guy he is and what kind of character he has. I think he'd do the same for me if the situation happened to me or someone else, so I think the whole team is really going to stand by him. He was hoping that nothing was going to happen, and I think the fans will really fall in love with him once they get to see him on the ice.''

Lukin's mother, Joanne, is standing behind her son with conviction.

"He made an error. He's being penalized very heavily by the CIS or CCES," Joann Lukin told the Calgary Herald.

She went on to tell the Herald that her son told the family he used cocaine on Halloween night ? three days before the unannounced Nov. 3 doping control test. Cocaine is a prohibited substance on the World Anti-Doping Agency's prohibited list. Lukin now faces two years of sport ineligibility in Canada and permanent ineligibility for federal sport funding.

"It's a little personal issue and he made the wrong choice one night, and that's it," Lukin's mother told the Herald. "It was definitely not a performance-enhancing drug. It was a recreation drug. We are really disappointed in the system, that they didn't support him. He's a really good kid. He's done a lot in his hockey career. It's just unfortunate. He was honest, and said that he did the drug. And they didn't support him."

As for the ECHL, McKenna confirmed Lukin's suspension, pointing out that even though the league does not have a drug testing policy, the league can suspend a player if he is has been convicted of possession, distribution or use of an illegal drug or if they're found to have had a positive test for an illegal drug.

From this point, the league will try to obtain official copies of the test administered by the CIS and any other pieces of evidence they need to finish their investigation and determine how strict of a suspension to hand down.

"As far as his pay status, that's to be determined," McKenna said by phone from the league offices in Princeton, N.J. "That's where the PHPA comes into this as well, but if in fact he's found guilty of this then obviously he'd be suspended without pay for a particular period of time. On the other hand we want to make sure that there are facts to support and not just suspend a player and take away his pay or his right to earn a living."