Eating to win: NHL stars find an edge by focusing on nutrition
Philipp Grubauer didn’t feel bad, exactly. He didn’t feel good, either.
The goaltender was merely coasting along during his inaugural season with the Colorado Avalanche in 2018-19, preparing for games as he always had and ignoring — at first — his body’s increasing lethargy.
At the time Grubauer was like most of his NHL peers, wielding a meticulous and well-thought-out pregame routine that didn’t include questioning how — or, more importantly, why — he was eating certain things. Convenience trumped everything.
And then, Grubauer hit a wall.
“I didn’t really pay attention to food my first years in the league. It wasn’t a big thing,” Grubauer told ESPN last month. “But the more I thought about it, I was actually feeling pretty tired [during games]. Like probably around the first or second period, I was usually pretty tired, and I would pump myself full of energy bars and all that [processed] stuff in between periods.
“It probably wasn’t right. But time is really short to cook something at home. By the time you get home from morning skate and have your nap, you almost have to get right back. I needed a way to make food easy so I could focus more on the game.”
It was around then that Grubauer, who now plays for the Seattle Kraken, received a call from Amanda Gyuran. She’s a Denver-based performance chef and co-founder of Elevated Eats, a meal prep service for professional athletes. The two got to talking, and Grubauer thought he had found a perfect solution, someone to design and execute an eating plan with minimal effort required on his part.
He signed on to be Gyuran’s client. It was the first step in an eye-opening journey ahead.
“At first it was just about the food,” Grubauer said. “And then we got rolling and we did a couple of tests, like gut tests and DNA tests where it shows what your body can absorb or what nutrients it can’t absorb. Like, from eating steak, your body might not pull iron out of the steak; it might pull it better out of salmon for example or from a different vegetable. So, from the time Amanda started cooking for me, we got it dialed in a little bit more and more.”
Welcome to the world of designer athlete nutrition. It’s an increasingly popular trend in an industry where longevity is paramount, execution is key and finding the slightest edge can add extra zeros to a paycheck.
GYURAN WORKS WITH players across every major sport, each with their own motivations for seeking out an alternative health approach but with a common goal of maximizing their potential. That requires taking an individual outlook on each person and getting down to the nitty-gritty of what makes their body tick.
“Before anything else, I have all my athletes go through advanced functional lab work with medical and naturopathic doctors,” Gyuran said. “That’s really their blood markers, stool, urine, genetics. That really helps us to customize both the supplements and meal plans we give them based on exactly what’s going on inside. We also test what antioxidants their bodies respond best with, and everyone is so different.”
That might be true on the genetics side. But through uncovering the unique variabilities of each client, Gyuran also found that athletes within certain sports were more alike internally than you’d expect.
“What’s kind of cool is that, especially with hockey players, they have a lot of similar things in their lab work around hormone levels and vitamin deficiencies,” Gyuran said. “It’s the lab work that really makes what we do most effective, because really anyone can make healthy foods for an athlete. But adding in all of these really specific ingredients helps us to give every meal a purpose.”
It’s an approach tailor-made for an athlete’s framework, the same way his skates are sized to an individual foot. When Kylene Bogden, a board-certified sports dietitian and functional nutritionist, was working at Cleveland Clinic early in her career, she began seeing players drawn to that more holistic, progressive approach in addressing not just food issues but overall health concerns.
She recalls one athlete who had no idea he was living with a dairy allergy. His daily bowls of cereal were causing unexplained chronic congestion and fatigue that wouldn’t resolve and ultimately impacted his performance. Bogden discovered the issue via blood work and within a day, she realized, “he could breathe again.”
“You’d see some of these athletes, and they weren’t healthy,” Bogden said. “They were bloated after every meal or they had a face full of acne, eczema, psoriasis, hives. They’re taking [medicine] every day to get through the season because of how crazy their allergies are. This is not OK. We have to dive deeper than this basic surface-level, conventional nutrition approach because it’s one thing to have a low body fat. But if your total body health is not in line, you’ll never reach peak performance, and we need to start making this unique to players.”
Having access to that standard of care and information is a privilege professional athletes have over the average person. Ditto being able to afford services like Gyuran’s that hand-deliver an optimal diet. It’s not a position Grubauer takes being in for granted, especially when the benefits of implementing his assigned changes came about more rapidly than expected.
“I would say [I felt different] in, like, a week,” he said. “Your body has to adjust a little bit, but once you eat the right stuff, your body starts to adapt right away. We were eating better, eating cleaner, and I didn’t have that tiredness anymore. So it started off just with food focus, and then once I got more knowledge behind her food and what she makes and the science behind it, it moved on to a different perspective.”
CALE MAKAR DOESN’T leave anything to chance. Not on the ice, not on his plate.
Colorado’s top-pairing defenseman found Gyuran when he ran up against some new dietary restrictions. Makar aimed to tackle the challenge head-on, and he relied on Gyuran’s adjustments to find a path forward supporting both his body and his play.
Makar was so impressed with the offerings and overall food philosophy that he began shunning some team-provided meals in favor of fueling road trips with Gyuran’s cooking too.
So Gyuran would pack Makar coolers to take with him. Then, rather than risk eating unknown fare in an unfamiliar city, Makar finds access to a microwave and heats up those preferred, pre-prepared dishes.
The reigning Norris and Conn Smythe trophy winner has no regrets.
“I take the pregames on the road, and I love it,” he said. “It can be a little bit of a hassle sometimes, but at the end of the day, I know exactly what I’m putting in my body, and there’s a convenience to it, for sure. It goes to the mental aspect of the game, knowing you don’t have any questions in the back of your mind: Did I do something wrong during the day? Did I not have the same pregame meal?
“You try to maintain and control everything that you can, and for me the diet aspect of it is definitely important.”
Not every athlete will be so fastidious about their eating, but Gyuran has seen a genuine uptick in the number who are. Like Makar, many are driven by mitigating the risk of switching up habits or by run-of-the-mill superstition that what worked well before one game will be the right choice again.
“A lot of the guys use the excuse of, ‘Oh, I’m already bringing so much stuff on the road’ or they don’t care enough to do it,” Gyuran said. “But the ones who do, they want to eat the food custom-made for them. So I vacuum seal meals in a cooler with their pregame meals or snacks in there. They’re getting muffins or recovery electrolyte gummies, or sometimes I’ll pack them up pregame drinks that really help to boost nitric oxide and blood flow and support their energy with beet juice and pomegranate juice. And then I add in specific ingredients based on their labs, whether it was B12 or the mushrooms that can help with energy and endurance.”
Those performance boosters were, until recently, a foreign concept to Makar. He admits to being a “picky eater” for much of his youth and to exploring the many dining hall options available during his first season at the University of Massachusetts in 2017-18.
When Makar arrived in the NHL two years later, he saw that some players were more careful about what they put in their body, and he got an education in the dressing room on how doing the right things nutritionally could lead to better results in his game.
Pivoting to Gyuran’s style of eating made that message hit home.
“Basically, all of my guys eat a Paleo-ish [diet],” she said. “It’s all gluten-free, soy-free and mostly dairy-free, with the exception of eating grass-fed butter and ghee sometimes. It’s refined-sugar-free and mostly grain-free. They’ll have white rice occasionally. But the focus is on high-quality organic grass-fed proteins. Starchy veggies and fruits are the carbohydrate sources. I find that a lot of athletes feel better on that.”
A typical meal for Makar consists of “sweet potato, maybe a little bit of rice, chicken, probably some salmon in there as well, and then usually there’s just some vegetables like a salad or some broccoli just to help digestion,” he said.
It’s a far cry from the stereotypical sustenance players are thought to be downing, such as sauce-laden pasta dishes or regular postgame pizzas. Those are still on the menu for some — and can certainly be seen now and then in the hallways outside an NHL dressing room — but Makar is among those who stick to what’s in his lunchbox.
“If you feel good when you’re eating a certain way, then it’s a no-brainer,” he said. “And in my mind, it’s just, ‘Why give up on that?’ Everybody’s always trying to get better, and that’s the atmosphere that you want. So regardless of if it’s during the game or food-wise, people are always looking for that edge.”
JAMES VAN RIEMSDYK recalls receiving some critical advice early in his career.
“I knew this performance coach years ago,” the Philadelphia Flyers winger said. “And I asked him, ‘What’s the one key thing that you’ve noticed from the guys that have longevity?’ And he goes, ‘They cut out all the bulls—.'”
That could be van Riemsdyk’s new mantra. The 33-year-old is in the latter half of his career and experiences the body changes that come with it. So even though van Riemsdyk gets “great care” from Philadelphia’s staff, he started exploring how to raise the bar in every health category and ensure more good years ahead on the ice.
“What [that coach] meant was that guys who last are very specific and intentional and targeted about what they’re trying to accomplish,” he said. “That’s training on the ice with skill work, but it’s also nutrition, sleep; they have it all in a good spot. You’ve got to know where your core principles should be. Those aren’t necessarily the flashiest things, but I think those are how you get the best results.”
Gyuran, who also works with van Riemsdyk, said the most common feedback she gets after a client switches diets is they “feel lighter and they can recover faster.” That was the most immediate change van Riemsdyk felt after implementing his own new regime, which includes functional mushrooms for focus, sunflower butter cups for a treat and a wide range of cuisines.
“The two biggest improvements are recovery and energy levels,” he said. “And then just how you sleep and how refreshed you feel waking up. I’ve always been into these sorts of things over the years and different edges you can find, whether it’s supplements or nutrition or training. There are different times where you have to get educated about how to support what you want to try to accomplish, and then how you can supplement your recovery and energy and all the good stuff.”
The process itself requires effort, though. Dr. Stephanie Canestraro is a certified functional medicine doctor and founder of the Vagus Clinic, through which she and her staff work with a wide range of athletes. Canestraro earns new clients via word of mouth from players who have shared her method on expanding good overall health. And that can be extensive. So Canestraro has to see where the commitment level is for each individual.
Basically, how bad do they want to feel good?
“We ask, ‘How many supplements are you willing to take?’ And we ask them how intense they want to be,” she said. “Because if a player gets supplement fatigue, they’ll stop. But when we have a full buy-in, we see results really quickly, even from adding one simple thing. A common issue we see is mitochondrial dysfunction. That’s how your cells make cellular energy. So if we do a test and see an area is low, we can add in one change [with a supplement] and they feel [improvement] right away. The more I explain to them why they’re taking each thing, the better they stick to it, and we try to make it as simple as possible.”
Canestraro said players who remove her protocols in the offseason frequently come back once preseason training ramps up again. It can be difficult to stick with the schedule she provides, but that looming issue of longevity — or lack thereof — brings athletes back.
“They know retrospectively that they felt better on the program,” she said. “And it’s a difference for them between potentially millions of dollars by playing better and getting a better contract the next year, or staying in the NHL and not going down to the AHL. So there’s a lot of stakes, and that’s when they’re usually more willing to really commit.”
Grubauer might be one of those well-paid players at the top of his game, but it isn’t lost on the 30-year-old that everyone has a shelf life. It’s worth embracing the Brussels sprouts to extend it.
“The biggest change since [getting a new food plan] is I think it almost cuts the recovery time in half. You have to take care of yourself to have a long career,” he said. “I introduced a lot of teammates to [different food ideas] because they’d go to McDonald’s after the game to get some food versus getting actually a good meal. That’s something that helps their body to recover and be ready for the next day, and that’s good for all of us.”
THE TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS love blasting music at practice. Behind the scenes, Margaret Hughes is their real master mixologist.
The Leafs’ lead performance dietitian makes it her mission to stave off nutritional boredom for players with an ever-changing playlist of post-workout provisions. It has become Hughes’ thing.
“The guys come off the ice, and I’ve prepared two or three different flavors of recovery shakes,” she said. “They get excited about taking the shake because they don’t know what flavor Margaret has come up with today. I come up with fun names too. I just really try to make food exciting and enjoyable for them as opposed to this traditional vanilla protein shake. In an 82-game regular season, that is going to get old very quickly.”
If there are more options than ever for getting outside help with diet, consider Hughes part of the in-house counsel for Maple Leafs players. About half of the NHL’s 32 clubs have dietitians and nutritionists working daily with players to promote their health goals, whether individually or in tandem with another trusted professional.
“We need to be collaborative,” Hughes said. “Our job is to ensure that every athlete is supported from all angles. My job is basically to complement them and ensure that whatever program is being recommended, I also support that and ensure that the athlete gets the best care that they possibly can. There’s lots of conversations and meetings between many professionals and practitioners.”
Hughes has a wide-ranging role with the Leafs that includes creating menus for the team plane, at hotels on the road and within visiting arenas. Toronto has two cooking staffs — one each at their home and practice rinks — with whom she designs the various plans. Chef Je-Marr Wright is at the helm of bringing Hughes’ culinary visions to life, and he shares her desire to keep things interesting for the players.
“I always try to make sure that September is different than October and then October is always different than November, and that way there’s always a variety of meals,” Wright said. “Players are really conscious about what they put into their body. They’ve definitely taken a big interest in actually knowing what they’re feeding themselves.”
Food is at the heart of Hughes’ focus. On the team side, they’re not providing “pills, powders and potions” so much as fresh fuel for players to choose from that’s readily available when they need it.
“We want to make sure that they’re consuming real food in real time,” she said. “We start with conversations around, ‘What part of the season are we in? What are the training demands? Which individuals may require more carbohydrates, less carbohydrates, more protein, less protein? Is it the day before a game?’
“Then maybe we focus more on carbohydrate-rich foods. Do we have a couple of days in between games? Then we start to look at how we can fit more vegetables and nutrient-dense foods in.”
That includes a keen focus on culturally appropriate meal offerings as well as introducing players to foods they might not have tried before. Wright said he recently added okra to the Leafs’ lunch options, a less familiar vegetable he hoped would land with guys, and perhaps become part of their eating rotation.
It’s a world away from the traditional white-carb-with-a-protein options — which Hughes acknowledges are still a go-to for some — but teams are cognizant of players seeking out nutrition-dense alternatives and have worked hard to provide them.
“The athletes are human, first and foremost. I think my job is to know them as people,” Hughes said. “We have players who come from various cultures, and we also try to understand how ethnic and cultural food preferences or traditional foods fit into their lives. Having access to whatever they need is the best way to optimize an athlete’s nutrition that matches their training demands, at the time that they need it.”
FOOD IS FUEL. Food can also be about pleasure, or having a good time with friends and family.
Even the most dedicated athletes deviate from their meal plan once in a while. But, like Makar making a bad read in front of the net, it doesn’t happen often.
“You allow yourself a few cheat meals,” Makar conceded. “Everybody would be lying if they said you’re eating the exact same way during the summer as you are in the season, for example. But for the most part, you don’t want to lose track of that sense of performance or trust in the eating habits that you have. You never stop doing what you can do to get that edge.”
When Grubauer was selected by Seattle in the 2021 NHL expansion draft after three seasons in Colorado (and nearly that long working with Gyuran) it was “really difficult” being in the Pacific Northwest without access to her meal prep. He actively tried bringing her out to cook for him, and she eventually trained someone Seattle-based in her method so there was a person with whom Grubauer and players like him could work.
“In our schedule and with the timeline during the season, you need to eat as well as you can to fuel your body,” Grubauer said. “And you want to get the best nutrition in order to be 100% the next day and perform at the highest level again and do it over and over again. I’m pretty superstitious, so if I felt like I had a good game, I want the same thing again.”
It’s about removing guesswork. Players spend hours studying video of opponents, searching for weaknesses to exploit and advantages to gain. Now that same focus is being turned onto the players themselves. Opening the door to individualized eating is a natural progression of dedication in athletes craving improvement by that proverbial 1% each day.
“I’m in the mindset that doing the right things is going to lead to better results,” Makar said. “And for me, the mental aspect of it and knowing exactly what you put in your body is a big part of it as well. It’s so important to just have all that super figured out and make sure there’s no surprises in terms of eating anything that I can’t control. You can never really go too wrong with that.”
Who will be the best running backs in college football in 2025?
We asked our college football reporters to vote for their top 10, distributing points based on their selections (10 points for a first-place vote, 9 points for second place and so on).
The results at the top include some familiar faces who made a mark in the College Football Playoff last season, but further down the list are some key transfers in new places and two freshmen who burst on to the scene, among others.
Here’s a look at our picks for the top 10 running backs in college football:
Points: 96 (8 of 10 first-place votes)
2024 stats: 163 carries, 1,125 yards, 17 TDs; 28 receptions, 237 yards, 2 TDs
Love emerged as Notre Dame’s top offensive playmaker during his sophomore season with 1,125 rushing yards and 17 touchdowns. He averaged 6.9 yards per carry. The only two FBS running backs with 150-plus attempts to average more yards per carry last season were Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty and Louisville’s Isaac Brown.
Love, at 6 feet and 212 pounds, is as effective earning the tough yards, as evidenced by his tackle-breaking touchdown against Penn State in the College Football Playoff, as he is breaking big plays. He had eight touchdowns of 30 yards or longer last season. The Irish want to get him the ball even more in 2025, as Love has lined up some as a wide receiver during spring practice. He caught 28 passes for 237 yards and two touchdowns in 2024. — Chris Low
Points: 82 (2 of 10 first-place votes)
2024 stats: 172 carries, 1,099 yards, 12 TDs; 41 receptions, 375 yards, 5 TDs
Singleton faced five-star expectations when he enrolled at Penn State in 2022 and has lived up to them throughout his time in State College. Now he’s coming back for his senior season to chase a national championship after helping the Nittany Lions break through to the CFP semifinals last season.
Singleton has put up a combined 4,673 all-purpose yards over the past three seasons, second most among all FBS backs behind Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty, and 41 career touchdowns. He has shared carries every season, averaging just 12.2 rushes per game over his career, but has consistently been highly productive and a true home run threat as a rusher, receiver and kick returner. — Max Olson
Points: 68
2024 stats: 220 carries, 1,108 yards, 8 TDs; 18 receptions, 153 yards, 2 TDs
ESPN’s Mel Kiper had Allen ranked as the No. 6 draft-eligible running back in the 2025 NFL draft class earlier this year. But rather than jumping to the pros, Allen will resume his position at Penn State as part of one of the nation’s most talented backfields alongside fourth-year quarterback Drew Allar and rushing partner Nicholas Singleton.
The Nittany Lions’ physical complement to Singleton and his elusive rushing style, Allen carried 220 times — fourth most among Big Ten running backs — and finished with 1,108 rushing yards and eight touchdowns as a junior in 2024. The 5-foot-11, 229-pound rusher averaged 6.7 yards per attempt across four postseason games, and ball security stands among his most valuable traits — Allen has lost one fumble across 559 career carries. — Eli Lederman
Points: 51
2024 stats (with Tulane): 265 carries, 1,401 yards, 15 TDs; 19 receptions, 176 yards, 2 TDs
The Tulane transfer ran for 1,401 yards last fall, ninth most nationally and more than any other returning running back. Hughes established himself as an exceptionally productive talent in two seasons with the Green Wave, and he lands at Oregon with two years of eligibility as an ideal replacement for 1,267-yard rusher Jordan James.
Hughes broke out for 1,378 yards on 258 carries as a freshman in 2023 before effectively replicating that rushing season. A key uptick in 2024: Hughes’ rushing touchdown count climbed from seven to 15. His 949 yards after first contact in 2024, per TruMedia, also leads all returning rushers in 2025. As the Ducks break in new quarterback Dante Moore, Hughes’ production and dependability could be especially important. — Lederman
Points: 45
2024 stats: 165 carries, 1,173 yards, 11 TDs; 30 receptions, 152 yards, 1 TD
There’s a good argument that last season, as a true freshman, Brown was the most explosive back in the country. Brown led all power-conference backs in yards per rush (7.11), had the fifth-most explosive runs (12 yards or more) with 33 and forced 41 missed tackles. His 8.2 yards-per-carry average between the tackles was a full yard better than any other power-conference running back. Brown also was a threat out of the backfield and in the return game. He eclipsed 99 yards of all-purpose yardage in eight of his past 10 games. — David Hale
Points: 38
2024 stats (with Louisiana-Monroe): 237 carries, 1,351 yards, 13 TDs; 8 receptions, 72 yards, 0 TDs
Hardy established himself as one of the top true freshmen in college football last season at Louisiana-Monroe. He rushed for 1,351 yards, including eight 100-yard games, and scored 13 touchdowns. He was overlooked by recruiters coming out of high school but was one of the top running back targets in the transfer portal and landed at Missouri.
Hardy, 5-foot-10 and 205 pounds, is at his best making defenders miss and churning out yards after contact. He was one of seven players nationally to have 1,000 yards or more after contact (1,012) last season. Hardy forced 91 missed tackles — only Boise State’s Ashton Jeanty and Arizona State’s Cam Skattebo had more. With Kewan Lacy leaving for Ole Miss, Hardy will get all the carries he can handle in 2025. — Low
Points: 31
2024 stats: 184 carries, 966 yards, 5 TDs; 52 receptions, 579 yards, 4 TDs
Reid made the move up from FCS Western Carolina to follow his offensive coordinator, Kade Bell, to Pitt last year and quickly proved he’s one of the most dynamic offensive playmakers in college football. The 5-8, 175-pound playmaker put up 1,704 all-purpose yards — 966 rushing, 579 receiving and 159 on punt returns — and scored 10 total touchdowns in an All-America debut season.
Reid achieved all that despite missing two games because of injury, and he finished fifth among all FBS players in all-purpose yards per game (154.9). The do-it-all back had three 200-yard performances over his first four games with the Panthers and will return for his senior season to produce plenty more in 2025. — Olson
Points: 19
2024 stats: 226 carries, 1,064 yards, 5 TDs; 44 receptions, 311 yards, 1 TD
Wisner stepped up in a big way for the Longhorns in 2024. Despite a depleted running back room and injuries to the offensive line across different portions of the season, Wisner had 1,064 yards and five touchdowns on the ground, adding 311 yards and another touchdown through the air. CJ Baxter should be back for the Longhorns after missing 2024 with a knee injury, but given what we saw from Wisner, he should still be well in the mix in the Texas backfield. — Harry Lyles Jr.
Points: 17
2024 stats: 169 carries, 944 yards, 9 TDs; 28 receptions, 166 yards, 3 TDs
Haynes, a wide receiver turned running back, has been one of the most consistent players in Georgia Tech’s offense over the past two seasons. Since 2023, Haynes has 2,003 yards on the ground and 16 touchdowns.
His versatility is something every team looks for in a back — he’s good at getting yards before defenders can get a hand on him (856 rushing yards before contact over the past two seasons, the most of any power-conference back in that span, per Pro Football Focus) and he’s good after they get a hand on him (his 1,145 yards after contact rank fourth, per PFF). In Haynes’ third year, the Yellow Jackets will be expecting much of the same. — Lyles
Points: 16
2024 stats: 175 carries, 1,028 yards, 12 TDs; 22 receptions, 217 yards, 1 TD
By mid October 2024, Washington had just 186 rushing yards and a touchdown to his credit (nearly all of which came against Air Force) and Baylor was a miserable 2-4 on the season. Then coach Dave Aranda tabbed Washington to serve as the Bears’ lead back, and everything changed.
Over the next six games, Washington racked up 127 carries for 818 yards and 11 touchdowns as Baylor won six straight. Washington was banged up early in Baylor’s bowl game against LSU and got just five carries — it’s no coincidence the Bears lost — but his growth throughout 2024 paired with that of quarterback Sawyer Robertson has Baylor thinking playoff in 2025. — Hale
Also receiving votes: Jonah Coleman, Washington, 15 points; Jaydn Ott, California, 14; Jahiem White, West Virginia, 14; Darius Taylor, Minnesota, 13; Caden Durham, LSU, 11; Jadan Baugh, Florida, 8; Nate Frazier, Georgia, 6; Jadarian Price, Notre Dame, 2; Le’Veon Moss, Texas A&M, 2; CJ Baxter, Texas, 1; Roman Hemby, Indiana 1
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Josh Weinfuss
AHMED HASSANEIN‘S JOURNEY to the doorstep of the NFL began on a balcony seven years ago in Cairo around a hookah.
With the roar of Cairo International Airport in the distance, Hassanein joined his two sisters, brother and nephew trading puffs in the sixth-floor penthouse they grew up in overlooking the Heliopolis suburb.
As they passed the hookah, Hassanein’s sisters, Gigi and Aziza Ibrahim, told Hassanein’s older brother, Cory Besch, about Hassanein’s life over the past decade after moving from California at age 6. Hassanein had forgotten how to speak English, had behavioral issues that caused him to be expelled from school, and was being raised by his mother, who he said had a substance abuse disorder.
“She was a very, very abusive person,” Hassanein told ESPN. “Like starting with addiction, with drugs and all that stuff, and she was really verbally abusive and physically abusive.”
Through it all, Hassanein took solace in sports including breakdancing, soccer, swimming, basketball, boxing, jujitsu, pingpong and CrossFit. He became the top-ranked CrossFit athlete in Egypt and one of the best in Africa. It also helped him cultivate a strong work ethic.
Besch, who was 30 at the time and making his first trip to Egypt in 20 years, hadn’t seen Hassanein in a decade. After hearing from his siblings that night — June 26, 2018 — Besch started formulating a plan to get Hassanein, then 15, back to the United States.
“I was like, ‘Well, what if he came and lived with me and played football for me?'” said Besch, who coached at Loara High School in Anaheim, California.
It was a major pivot for Hassanein, who was set to attend Riverside Preparatory, a military school in Gainesville, Georgia.
“I remember Aziza telling me, ‘It’s going to be really hard, and it’s going to be one of the most difficult things you’ve ever done because the culture shock is going to be there, you’re going to lose all your friends, you can’t speak English very well,'” Hassanein said.
“And I was like, ‘I can do it.'”
During a family vacation at a resort on the Red Sea later that week, Besch helped convince their father to let him move away 7,500 miles. A month later, Hassanein was on a plane to Los Angeles.
Fast-forward to today and — despite initial language barriers, lack of football knowledge and playing the sport for the first time as a sophomore in high school — Hassanein is on the verge of becoming the first Egyptian to be drafted into the NFL. ESPN draft analyst Matt Miller has the former Boise State defensive end, who is 6-foot-2, 267 pounds, going in the sixth round at pick No. 216 in his latest mock draft.
“It was surreal to think that we just dreamed this to save Ahmed and get him to the U.S., like ‘Project Mission: Get Ahmed to the U.S.,’ and then it was ‘Mission: Get Ahmed into College,’ and now it’s ‘Mission: Get Ahmed into the NFL,'” Gigi said from her apartment in Cairo.
“But it’s all surreal because who would’ve thought that Ahmed would be great at being a defensive lineman in American football when literally seven years ago, he was just sitting on the balcony praying that someone would … get him out of this misery.”
THE CULTURE SHOCK was real for Hassanein when he moved in with Besch in August 2018.
Everything from the food to the language to school was different. And then there was football.
All Hassanein knew about the sport was what Besch had posted on social media, most recently playing in a second-tier Austrian league from March to June 2018, just before he visited Egypt.
“People run and hit each other,” Hassanein recalled. “That’s all I know.”
When Hassanein arrived in California, Besch gave him a crash course, explaining everything from how to put on his pads, helmet and mouth guard to the sport’s rules.
“Everything from line of scrimmage to downs to your role and responsibility on the defense,” Besch said. “And I don’t think everything was explained explicitly because you don’t ever go back and explain the X’s and O’s in high school, right?”
Hassanein didn’t know how to get in a stance or how to catch a ball, said Mitch Olson, Hassanein’s head coach at Loara. His school’s football program was in one of the lower levels in California and didn’t have the resources other schools around them had. Each coach was in charge of multiple positions, and most of the kids didn’t play football before ninth grade because there wasn’t a youth program in the district.
“It’s like the kid got pulled off of Mars and started playing football,” Olson said.
Still, Olson saw the potential in the 16-year-old sophomore. He lined up Hassanein, then 6-foot-1 and 210 pounds, at defensive tackle on the junior varsity team for the first game of the season before moving him up to varsity. It was, by all accounts, an experiment.
Hassanein had at least one penalty every game because of his unfamiliarity with the rules. There was a game in which he grabbed a quarterback’s face mask to bring him down and another in which he tripped the quarterback, who was about to scramble by him. He remembered throwing players, kicking people and flipping them like in jiujitsu.
“I was out there just doing whatever,” Hassanein said. “I was just out there being physical. See ball, get ball.”
In fall 2018, Hassanein was watching highlights of former Los Angeles Rams defensive tackle Aaron Donald.
“What high school does he go to?” Hassanein asked his brother.
“And he was like, ‘Bro, that’s the NFL, that’s the National Football League.’ I was like, ‘OK, I want to go there.’ And he was like, ‘Bro, you know you don’t have a D-line coach at your high school and you don’t have a sled?'”
It didn’t matter to Hassanein. After talking to his brother and Olson, and watching videos, he devised a plan: Hassanein began waking up at 5 a.m. every day to work out before school. After school, he’d go to practice — either football or basketball, depending on the season — and then go back to the gym for three to four hours a night.
Everything started to click for Hassanein midway through his sophomore season.
The key, Besch, Olson and defensive coordinator Jonathan Rangel decided, was to let Hassanein’s natural strength make up for whatever technique he lacked. It worked.
Eventually, Besch started taking Hassanein to camps, where he was facing — and outplaying — prospects from top high school programs around Southern California such as St. John Bosco and Mater Dei. The night before one camp, Hassanein studied pass-rush moves on YouTube and implemented them the next day.
Colleges noticed the three-star pass rusher. On Aug. 27, 2020, as his senior season was postponed until the spring because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Hassanein received a direct message from Spencer Danielson, now Boise State’s head coach, who was then coaching the defensive line. He loved Hassanein’s film.
Hassanein told his brother, who couldn’t believe it. Besch played football with Danielson at Azusa Pacific University. Hassanein relayed that information to Danielson, and they hopped on a Zoom call to explain the situation.
Hassanein had scholarship offers from Fresno State, Duke, Kansas and Colorado before eventually choosing Boise State.
Had Hassanein’s life followed his initial plan of going to military school, looking back, he thought he’d return to Egypt after four years. Instead, he was living out a dream he never knew he had.
“It meant the world to me that somebody believed, and my brother always believed in me, but it gave me confirmation that I can do this,” Hassanein said. “I took it as a challenge because I had a lot of family members say, ‘You’re going to come back in two weeks. You’re never going to succeed. You can’t even speak English. How the hell are you going to play football?’
“And I really made it. I took it as, ‘OK, watch this.'”
DANIELSON STOOD OUTSIDE Boise State’s football facility on a June morning in 2021 with a hope and a prayer.
Because of COVID-19 restrictions, neither Danielson nor any of his coaches were able to recruit Hassanein in person, so the first time they met him was when he stepped out of the car that day. Sitting in the back of Danielson’s mind was the fact that Besch was 5-foot-8, 150 pounds in college.
“I’m waiting for him at the front of the facility like, ‘Please be 6-3. Please be 6-3,'” Danielson recalled to ESPN. “If he pops out and he’s 5-9 and Cory got me, I’m going to be really hot.
“And he pops out and he just looks like a Greek god. I’m like, ‘Yes.'”
His first year on campus, Hassanein looked like some of the Broncos’ juniors and was lifting more weight than a number of the upperclassmen, Boise State edge coach Jabril Frazier said.
From a football standpoint, Hassanein was very much a freshman.
“He didn’t know what was going on,” Frazier said. “But he played at a high level.”
Danielson’s way of rectifying that was with his “Football School,” a weeklong program leading into fall camp for all of Boise State’s incoming freshmen. It covered everything from the width of the field — 53.3 yards — to the verbiage Boise State’s coaches prefer to the fundamentals of tackling to A, B and C gaps.
For Hassanein, college football was an entirely new game. In high school, he relied on his natural ability to dominate. Not so much in college. He had to account for how the offensive lineman across from him lined up and blocked in every possible scenario and what kind of offense he was facing on a weekly basis.
It was essentially Football 101 for Hassanein.
“It was really eye-opening,” he said.
In 20 games over his first two seasons, he had two sacks. Then, going into his junior year in 2023, it all clicked. Hassanein finished with 12.5 sacks and was mentioned among the nation’s best pass rushers.
Heading into his senior season, he was coming off labrum surgery and spent the spring watching his own film and breaking down his games while he rehabbed. Hassanein had 9.5 sacks in 2024, giving him 24 for his career, the fourth most in school history.
“I currently have him projected as a late fifth- to early sixth-round pick as teams are always looking for pass-rush help,” ESPN draft analyst Jordan Reid said. “Hassanein will likely be a part of special teams early on during his career while he searches to earn a role as a contributor on defense.”
Hassanein is on the verge of making international history. When he does, it will be an emotional moment for those who helped him on the journey.
“The journey that dude made and the guts that he had to do, the things that he did to get to where he is, it is storybook, man,” Olson said. “It really is. It’s a frigging movie.”
He knows he’s not the biggest or quickest, but he says he thinks his strength will help him become a disruptive pass rusher at the next level.
Danielson described Hassanein as “one of the most violent run defenders we’ve ever had here,” pointing to the Broncos’ first defensive play of the Fiesta Bowl against Penn State.
It was first-and-10 from the Nittany Lions’ 28-yard line when Penn State tight end Tyler Warren went in motion from left to right, overloading the side closest to Hassanein. It was a run and, with a running start, Hassanein bulldozed Warren back four yards, throwing him to the ground in the process.
To Danielson, that play is everything teams need to know about Hassanein.
“Once he gets there, he’s going to be all over the coaches about being better, getting better, getting help,” Frazier said. “Give him a year to two years in the NFL and you’ll be hearing his name a lot.”
As the defending Presidents’ Trophy winners, the New York Rangers were envisioned as a playoff team again in 2024-25. As the team on top of the league standings in early December, similar words could be written about the Minnesota Wild.
And yet, heading into Wednesday night’s matchup between the clubs (7 p.m. ET, ESPN+), nothing is certain about either team’s playoff chances after the pair has gone 8-9-3 in the past 10 games apiece.
The Wild enter the game in a playoff position, and have a 91.0% chance to make the playoffs per Stathletes. A key part of that is the team’s remaining strength of schedule; their remaining opponents have a 46.0% winning percentage, which is the second-easiest path. (Only the New Jersey Devils face a weaker slate in the final stretch.)
Compare that to the Rangers, who have a 27.3% chance, and will begin this game on the outside looking in. New York’s remaining slate is considerably more difficult; a 54.1% opponents’ winning percentage ranks as the second toughest, behind only the Detroit Red Wings.
If the Wild qualify as the first wild card, their likely first-round opponent is the Vegas Golden Knights; if they land in the second wild-card position, their likely opponent is the Winnipeg Jets. Unfortunately, Minnesota went 0-3 against both teams this season.
The Rangers’ more likely outcome as a playoff entrant is as the second wild card, which earns them a matchup against the Washington Capitals; the Caps have won all three games against New York this season. The Rangers could wind up as the first wild card, earning a matchup against the Atlantic Division champ. They went 1-2 against the Toronto Maple Leafs, 0-2 against the Florida Panthers (with one more game coming up on April 14), and 0-1 against the Tampa Bay Lightning (with games coming up on April 7 and April 17).
So, the future isn’t blindingly bright in the playoffs for these teams. But all you need is a ticket in, and unexpected things can happen!
There are just over two weeks left until the season’s end on April 17, and we’ll help you track it all with the NHL playoff watch. As we traverse the final stretch, we’ll provide details on all the playoff races, along with the teams jockeying for position in the 2025 NHL draft lottery.
Note: Playoff chances are via Stathletes.
Jump ahead:
Current playoff matchups
Today’s schedule
Yesterday’s scores
Expanded standings
Race for No. 1 pick
Current playoff matchups
Eastern Conference
A1 Toronto Maple Leafs vs. WC1 Ottawa Senators
A2 Tampa Bay Lightning vs. A3 Florida Panthers
M1 Washington Capitals vs. WC2 Montreal Canadiens
M2 Carolina Hurricanes vs. M3 New Jersey Devils
Western Conference
C1 Winnipeg Jets vs. WC2 Minnesota Wild
C2 Dallas Stars vs. C3 Colorado Avalanche
P1 Vegas Golden Knights vs. WC1 St. Louis Blues
P2 Los Angeles Kings vs. P3 Edmonton Oilers
Wednesday’s games
Note: All times ET. All games not on TNT or NHL Network are available to stream on ESPN+ (local blackout restrictions apply).
Minnesota Wild at New York Rangers, 7 p.m.
Washington Capitals at Carolina Hurricanes, 7 p.m. (TNT)
Florida Panthers at Toronto Maple Leafs, 7:30 p.m.
Colorado Avalanche at Chicago Blackhawks, 9:30 p.m. (TNT)
Seattle Kraken at Vancouver Canucks, 10:30 p.m.
Tuesday’s scoreboard
Washington Capitals 4, Boston Bruins 3
Montreal Canadiens 3, Florida Panthers 2 (OT)
Buffalo Sabres 5, Ottawa Senators 2
Columbus Blue Jackets 8, Nashville Predators 4
Tampa Bay Lightning 4, New York Islanders 1
St. Louis Blues 2, Detroit Red Wings 1 (OT)
Utah Hockey Club 3, Calgary Flames 1
Edmonton Oilers 3, Vegas Golden Knights 2
Anaheim Ducks 4, San Jose Sharks 3 (SO)
Los Angeles Kings 4, Winnipeg Jets 1
Expanded standings
Atlantic Division
Points: 94
Regulation wins: 37
Playoff position: A1
Games left: 8
Points pace: 104.1
Next game: vs. FLA (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 99.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 93
Regulation wins: 38
Playoff position: A2
Games left: 8
Points pace: 103.1
Next game: @ OTT (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 99.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 92
Regulation wins: 35
Playoff position: A3
Games left: 8
Points pace: 102.0
Next game: @ TOR (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 99.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 84
Regulation wins: 30
Playoff position: WC1
Games left: 8
Points pace: 93.1
Next game: vs. TB (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 99.8%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 79
Regulation wins: 25
Playoff position: WC2
Games left: 8
Points pace: 87.5
Next game: vs. BOS (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 44.7%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 75
Regulation wins: 26
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 83.1
Next game: vs. CAR (Friday)
Playoff chances: 2.9%
Tragic number: 13
Points: 70
Regulation wins: 26
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 77.6
Next game: vs. TB (Saturday)
Playoff chances: 0.1%
Tragic number: 8
Points: 69
Regulation wins: 23
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 7
Points pace: 75.4
Next game: @ MTL (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 0.1%
Tragic number: 5
Metro Division
Points: 105
Regulation wins: 41
Playoff position: M1
Games left: 8
Points pace: 116.4
Next game: @ CAR (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 100%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 94
Regulation wins: 40
Playoff position: M2
Games left: 9
Points pace: 105.6
Next game: vs. WSH (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 99.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 87
Regulation wins: 35
Playoff position: M3
Games left: 6
Points pace: 93.9
Next game: vs. NYR (Saturday)
Playoff chances: 99.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 77
Regulation wins: 24
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 9
Points pace: 86.5
Next game: vs. COL (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 16.7%
Tragic number: 17
Points: 77
Regulation wins: 32
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 85.3
Next game: vs. MIN (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 27.3%
Tragic number: 15
Points: 74
Regulation wins: 25
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 82
Next game: vs. MIN (Friday)
Playoff chances: 8.7%
Tragic number: 12
Points: 71
Regulation wins: 20
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 7
Points pace: 77.6
Next game: @ STL (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 0.1%
Tragic number: 7
Points: 71
Regulation wins: 20
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 6
Points pace: 76.6
Next game: @ MTL (Saturday)
Playoff chances: ~0%
Tragic number: 5
Central Division
Points: 106
Regulation wins: 40
Playoff position: C1
Games left: 7
Points pace: 115.9
Next game: @ VGK (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 100%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 102
Regulation wins: 40
Playoff position: C2
Games left: 8
Points pace: 113.0
Next game: vs. NSH (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 100%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 94
Regulation wins: 38
Playoff position: C3
Games left: 7
Points pace: 102.8
Next game: @ CHI (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 99.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 89
Regulation wins: 30
Playoff position: WC1
Games left: 6
Points pace: 96.0
Next game: vs. PIT (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 92.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 88
Regulation wins: 33
Playoff position: WC2
Games left: 7
Points pace: 96.2
Next game: @ NYR (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 91%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 80
Regulation wins: 26
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 7
Points pace: 87.5
Next game: vs. LA (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 0.4%
Tragic number: 7
Points: 62
Regulation wins: 23
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 7
Points pace: 67.8
Next game: @ DAL (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 0%
Tragic number: E
Points: 51
Regulation wins: 18
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 56.5
Next game: vs. COL (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 0%
Tragic number: E
Pacific Division
Points: 98
Regulation wins: 42
Playoff position: P1
Games left: 8
Points pace: 108.6
Next game: vs. WPG (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 100%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 93
Regulation wins: 37
Playoff position: P3
Games left: 8
Points pace: 103.1
Next game: @ UTA (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 99.9%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 91
Regulation wins: 31
Playoff position: P2
Games left: 8
Points pace: 100.8
Next game: @ SJ (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 99.1%
Tragic number: N/A
Points: 82
Regulation wins: 26
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 90.9
Next game: vs. ANA (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 13.9%
Tragic number: 11
Points: 81
Regulation wins: 26
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 89.8
Next game: vs. SEA (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 2.7%
Tragic number: 10
Points: 74
Regulation wins: 23
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 82.0
Next game: @ CGY (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 0%
Tragic number: 3
Points: 68
Regulation wins: 25
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 7
Points pace: 74.3
Next game: @ VAN (Wednesday)
Playoff chances: 0%
Tragic number: E
Points: 50
Regulation wins: 14
Playoff position: N/A
Games left: 8
Points pace: 55.4
Next game: vs. EDM (Thursday)
Playoff chances: 0%
Tragic number: E
Note: An “x” means that the team has clinched a playoff berth. An “e” means that the team has been eliminated from playoff contention.
Race for the No. 1 pick
The NHL uses a draft lottery to determine the order of the first round, so the team that finishes in last place is not guaranteed the No. 1 selection. As of 2021, a team can move up a maximum of 10 spots if it wins the lottery, so only 11 teams are eligible for the No. 1 pick. Full details on the process are here. Matthew Schaefer, a defenseman for the OHL’s Erie Otters, is No. 1 on the draft board.
Points: 50
Regulation wins: 14
Points: 51
Regulation wins: 18
Points: 62
Regulation wins: 23
Points: 68
Regulation wins: 25
Points: 70
Regulation wins: 26
Points: 69
Regulation wins: 23
Points: 71
Regulation wins: 20
Points: 71
Regulation wins: 20
Points: 74
Regulation wins: 23
Points: 74
Regulation wins: 25
Points: 75
Regulation wins: 26
Points: 77
Regulation wins: 32
Points: 77
Regulation wins: 24
Points: 80
Regulation wins: 26
Points: 81
Regulation wins: 26
Points: 82
Regulation wins: 26
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