15 year old hockey player dies tragically, family says it was preventable.

A terrible tragedy struck the hockey community last week when a young hockey player tragically lost his life far too soon.

15 year old Nolan Ion died tragically on March 18th after suffering a cardiac arrest during a gym class at his high school the day prior. While the loss of any young man of this age is always a tragedy, this one hits particularly hard given the comments that the family has made since Nolan's tragic death.

A recent report from Joseph Quigley of Barrie Today had revealed that the family believes young Nolan's death could have been prevented. Nolan's father James revealed that his son had been dealing with a lung issue for a period of time, but also revealed that the family had sought medical help in the days leading up to Nolan's death. According to James, Nolan was taken to Southlake Health only 3 days before he would suffer the cardiac arrest, but was cleared by doctors after an xray.

"I’ve lost all faith in the Newmarket hospital … The only way he was going to be saved was Saturday night," said James as per BarrieToday.com.

It's hard to blame James for feeling this way especially after he expressed his concerns to medical professionals. James says his son's mother had informed doctors about blood clotting issues he had as a young man, suffering from severe blood clots in his leg at the young age of 18.

Nolan's head coach, Leo Baker, claims that the family was not taken seriously.

"They overlooked every little problem," said Baker.

Baker himself witnessed Nolan's struggles, especially when it came to high exertion out on the ice.

"Every game, he still didn’t have the energy. He didn’t have the wind capacity," Baker said. "You’d only see it on the ice."

Baker isn't looking to point the finger of blame however, but is instead hoping that Nolan's tragic passing can help serve as a warning to prevent any more young players his age from suffering a similar fate.

"Seeing this young lad pass away from something that maybe could have been preventable," said Baker. "I don’t want to blame. I’m not trying to. I don’t want somebody else’s child to lose a life because maybe there was something else that could have been done … How can we make this a teaching moment?"

A GoFundMe was set up when Nolan first suffered his cardiac arrest and I am happy to report that members of the hockey community have once again been extremely generous in their support. If you would like to support the family and most importantly are able to do so, you can find the GoFundMe located here.

My most sincere condolences go out to everyone impacted by this terrible tragedy, but most of all to Nolan's parents who did all they could to prevent this from happening. I can't imagine the pain they are going through.