{"id":177556,"date":"2025-08-26T17:16:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-26T17:16:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/177556\/"},"modified":"2025-08-26T17:16:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-26T17:16:11","slug":"david-ayres-was-a-hockey-hero-now-hes-making-a-movie-his-own-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/177556\/","title":{"rendered":"David Ayres Was a Hockey Hero. Now He’s Making a Movie His Own Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tDavid Ayres<\/a> was hitting the lowest point of his life \u2014 the lowest point, really, of any life. Having endured a kidney transplant and all the medical issues that come with it at 27, he was, several years later, feeling he had no reason to live, nothing motivating him to even get out of bed in the morning.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAyres had once been a promising hockey goalie. But the medical issues ended all that without even a whiff of the minors, and now the Ontario native, living on added\u00a0but borrowed time, wondered why he should even go on. He met with a friend and explained his situation; she encouraged him to get help and maybe even a job in a rink? He had long been versed in matters of ice maintenance. This way, he could be around the game he loved and perhaps even get in a little scrimmaging on the side. He took a job as an equipment and operations person, ending up at a rink in Calgary.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo began a journey that would bring the workaday maintenance man from a modest Toronto suburb back from the brink \u2014 and, eventually, to a place where he became the oldest goalie to win an NHL<\/a> regular-season game, the only goalie to come out of the stands to win an NHL game, and to one of the most unusual folk heroes modern sports has ever known.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlong the way Ayres has also become both a Hollywood cautionary tale and an inspirational example, a man once broought aboard by Disney<\/a> and CAA who nonetheless demonstrates (he hopes) the power of going your own indie way. And has done so with the kind of diffidence that can only come from a lifetime in the sports backwaters.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI have to admit I didn\u2019t imagine a lot of it playing out this way,\u201d Ayres says with an everyman shrug, \u201cI just wanted to be on the ice.\u201d He didn\u2019t realize how slippery that would make things.<\/p>\n

\n\t**<\/p>\n

\n\tThe night of February 22, 2020 was not, as sports dates go, one that anyone might\u2019ve expected historians to pen chapters about. The NFL season was three weeks finished; MLB\u2019s opening day was four weeks away (and eventually thwarted by COVID); the lineup of NBA and NHL games was unremarkable. Eleven hockey games were played that night, two of them going to shootouts.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe contest between the Carolina Hurricanes and\u00a0Toronto Maple Leafs at Scotia Bank\u00a0Arena in downtown Toronto was not one of them. The box-score shows the Canes winning 6-3, a routine victory in a humdrum part of the calendar.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut peer a little deeper and you\u2019ll see the winning goalie was one David Ayres, a 42-year-old ice-maintenance man for the Maple Leafs\u2019 minor-league affiliate Marlies three kilometers west on Lakeshore Boulevard, a 42-year-old who had never been in an NHL game before that night \u2014 a 42-year-old who had bought some snacks and was hanging out in the stands when the game began.<\/p>\n

\n\tThanks to the Emergency Backup Goalie rule that has both teams retaining the same neutral player in case of multiple injuries \u2014 think the \u201cofficial quarterback\u201d from childhood touch-football games \u2014 Ayres was technically capable of playing that night. (Early in the morning, before his official operations job began with the Marlies, he would often practice with the team as a scrimmage goalie.)\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tMore than that \u2014 thanks to the so-called \u201cEBUG\u201d rule, Ayres was technically capable that night of playing for the visiting team. So when both Canes goalies went down to injury\u00a0in the game\u2019s first 30 minutes with the club up 3-1, Ayres got a text that he might want to hurry down to the locker room.<\/p>\n

\n\tAnd that\u2019s how the\u00a042-year-old sometime-Zamboni driver ended up in front of 18,000 of his hometown fans, as a member of the hometown organization \u2014 playing against his hometown team. He had been wearing a Leafs T-shirt to show that hometown support. He didn\u2019t even take it off \u2014 he just pulled over it the Hurricanes\u00a0jersey\u00a0he was hastily handed.<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter rushing onto the ice, Ayres gave up goals on each of the first two shots \u2014 who wouldn\u2019t? But then he made one save, then another, and another. Somehow, in the\u00a0period-plus of hockey that followed, Ayres stopped all eight of the next shots, against All-Stars like Auston Matthews and Mitch Marner. \u201cI don\u2019t think they took it easy on me,\u201d Ayres recalls of those players. \u201cMaybe they could\u2019ve taken a step or two in but only a few times.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Hurricanes, meanwhile, scored three goals. And when the final horn sounded, Ayres had the win, the first-ever in the decades-long history of EBUG goalies. With both Canes and Leafs players mobbing him, it was probably the only time in sports history both the winning and losing team were exultant. Ayres had achieved his dream: he had played and won in the NHL. And won the adoration of a continent in the process.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tA cardboard cutout of famed emergency goaltender David Ayers #90 of the Carolina Hurricanes is photographed during an NHL game against the Tampa Bay Lightning on the 1 year anniversary on February 22, 2021 at PNC Arena in Raleigh, North Carolina.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tPhoto by Gregg Forwerck\/NHLI via Getty Images<\/p>\n

\n\t**<\/p>\n

\n\tOne byproduct\u00a0in our attention-competitive world of doing something extraordinary as an ordinary person is that it tends to attract Hollywood people. Lots and lots of Hollywood people.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the days after his improbable win, Ayres got calls from and took impromptu meetings with representatives of no fewer than 27 production companies \u2014 all electrified by his story, all swearing they and they alone could do it justice. Ayres listened to them all patiently, then decided to go with James Corden and his production company Fulwell 73.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tCorden had called Ayres shortly after the game just to congratulate the goalie \u2014 the host and performer saw a little of his own story as a humble middle-class son of a Bible salesman who\u2019d put in the hard work and was touched by fate. Corden was one of the few not pitching him on a movie, just telling the ice-maintenance man he thought what he did was pretty cool. \u201cIt just seemed genuine, which I really liked,\u201d Ayres says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tAyres soon signed with an agency, CAA, and made a development deal with Disney, with Corden\u2019s company producing. He was on his way to a new Hollywood career. In the outside world COVID raged and Ayres, put out of a job by the shutdown of all professional hockey, had to take remote work as a refrigeration salesman \u2014 he knew ice, after all. But on Zoom calls and in his mind, he was on his way to becoming the next Rudy.<\/p>\n

\n\tUnfortunately another byproduct of attracting Hollywood in our media-competitive world is that everyone in it thinks they know the best way to tell your story. Though assured early on he would be an integral part of the movie \u2014 he could even be in front of the camera shooting hockey scenes \u2014 Ayres was not consulted on the script, did not talk to any writers and, indeed, after a while had trouble hearing from his agents. \u201cI don\u2019t wish anyone anything bad but it all started to leave a bad taste in my mouth,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhat little he did hear didn\u2019t fill him with hope. Disney seemed interested in turning his story into a comedy. Sounded fun \u2014 except Ayres didn\u2019t feel particularly comedic about what happened. He had overcome a kidney transplant (his mother had donated it), depression, a divorce and a whole lot of early mornings and late nights in arena-operations jobs. Most devastatingly was the cancer-related death of his father \u2014 a train conductor who when he was younger quit his job to be close to his family, and also Ayres\u2019 closest friend and coach \u2014 not too long before the big night.\u00a0Getting onto the ice wasn\u2019t a light tale \u2014 it was a testament to the power of grit. Ayres loved Rudy\u00a0and Invincible and Miracle. They put a smile on your face, sure, but only after leaving a lump in your throat. And Disney was disregarding all of that.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tDavid Ayres signs autographs for fans during the game between the Dallas Stars and Carolina Hurricanes at at PNC Arena on February 25, 2020 in Raleigh, North Carolina.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGrant Halverson\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI do a lot of inspirational speeches and I always tell people it\u2019s not the hockey\u00a0\u2014 sports just happens to be my path,\u201d he says. \u201cThe real message is that just because something bad happens in your life you can\u2019t give up on what you want; you have to find the strength to keep going even when you\u2019re fragile. Hope in fragile times, that\u2019s what it\u2019s about.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tDisney also wanted a big female romantic lead at the arena that night. But though Ayres had been married in 2020 and his wife was at the game, he subsequently underwent a bitter divorce and didn\u2019t want his ex-wife represented in the movie.<\/p>\n

\n\tAyres had landed the golden ticket \u2014 how many people working ordinary jobs find the country\u2019s most famous studio wanting to make a movie about them? \u2014 only to learn he deeply didn\u2019t want the prize.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhen the Disney option lapsed a few years later, Ayres decided not to shop it anew. Instead, he chose to do something very different: hire a writer who\u2019d never had a produced screenplay in his life.<\/p>\n

\n\t**<\/p>\n

\n\tJim Tamburino is not someone, if your Hollywood project is hitting the skids, you\u2019d normally bring on to get it back on track. The Long Island fortysomething has worked an assortment of entertainment-world odd-jobs without getting a movie made, while also focusing on other pursuits like a hockey fundraiser near his hometown.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBut he has a passion for the sport and, as is evident from even a short conversation with him, a knack for envisioning a dramatic cinematic story. He had a vision for this movie \u2014 it would begin that 2020 night, flash back to Ayres\u2019 dark depressive days and culminate back on the ice in Toronto. More important, he understood the tone the subject wanted: hopeful but serious.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt felt to me right away like a story about someone who just works really hard not knowing it would work out, but that\u2019s OK because he just loved what he did,\u201d says Tamburino. That vibe was captured by a scene after the game that Tamburino includes in his script: a bunch of Ayres\u2019 friends want to take him out to\u00a0celebrate the moment. But as he loads his equipment back in his truck, he declines \u2014 he has to be at the arena for practice and work early the next morning.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo back and forth the pair went, draft after draft, hammering out issues both structural and specific, Ayres doing it on breaks from his new job as a freight-train conductor between Ontario and New York. (He does still play, at 48, in an Ontario senior league.) The script, he says, kept improving, before it eventually became a potent, tidy look at one man and the obstacles he overcame \u2014 the obstacles, through his various forms of ordinariness, Ayres hopes everyone could overcome. Oh, and through the magical-thinking of screenwriting, the woman with Ayres at the game was now his kidney-donating mother. This was a chance to do the fairy-tale over, and even better.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhich brings the story to the present day. Before Ayres had a weak script and a lot of interest. Now he has what he says is a strong script and no interest.\u00a0But this is the Zamboni Goalie, and that kind of thing doesn\u2019t bow him. He has brought on two entertainment-world figures, an indie director named Dennis Latos and an indie producer named David Schuster, as producers. Neither has a ton of big-time credits either. But Ayres has been with the big-time. He didn\u2019t like the big-time. So he and Tamburino are going another route. They\u2019re hoping this producing pair can raise some money for an indie project.\u00a0(Schuster says in an email that \u201cThere are some hockey greats associated with pro hockey and the NHL, names like Maurice Richard, Gordie Howe, Bobby Orr and Wayne Gretzky.\u201d Ayres, with very different stat lines but a similar spirit, can he hopes now join them, he says.)<\/p>\n

\n\tAyres and Tamburino have ideas on who else could be involved. The have talked to David Boreanaz as a possible director; the hyphenate is a Flyers super-fan and feels the game in his bones. Actors have not been consulted, but the duo like Wyatt Russell, who not only starred in\u00a0Goon: Last of the Enforcers\u00a0but played goalie in Europe, and so would understand both movement and the mindset. They feel like Hollywood gave up on them. But they\u2019ve not given up on a movie.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s something fitting about the film odyssey they\u2019re on. After all, the story itself is about not doing things the easy way.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI think about that a lot,\u201d Ayres says. \u201cHow a movie about my journey is as hard and winding as the journey itself. But that\u2019s OK. I mean, I have to learn my own lesson, right? I have to believe it will work out, no matter how dark it seems, no matter how many years it takes.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile he and Tamburino go over the script again and again. The latest draft follows the same flashback structure, though now with a twist: it doesn\u2019t end that night of the game. It ends with Ayres as a train conductor, fulfilling the dream his late father never saw through. As he always said, it was never about the hockey.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"David Ayres was hitting the lowest point of his life \u2014 the lowest point, really, of any life.…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":177557,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[100674,7299,293,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-177556","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-david-ayres","9":"tag-disney","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115096203194549341","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177556\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/177557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}