Golden Knights call NHL’s coronavirus testing ‘seamless’

The Golden Knights’ daily routine now includes more than taping sticks and lacing up skates.

Every day the team walks from the JW Marriott Edmonton ICE District hotel to Ford Hall, the main entrance to Rogers Place, and gets tested for COVID-19 to make sure the bubble the NHL has created remains virus-free. Right wing Reilly Smith, defenseman Nate Schmidt and coach Pete DeBoer said the process has been “seamless.”

The team has walked in and out quickly and then is free to get on with the rest of the day.

“It’s really quite flawless,” Schmidt said. “It’s been really good. You go through it each day, and it kind of just becomes a part of the routine here moving forward.”

Each team has a designated time to go through testing so clubs can be isolated as much as possible. DeBoer said the Knights were given a 45-minute window Monday but were done in 15 to 20 minutes.

Schmidt said there’s 12 lanes available so each player can get his RT-PCR nasal swab test administered by personnel from nearby DynaLIFE medical labs. Results are available within 24 hours. The NHL said Monday it had no positive tests over the last week of training camp from July 18 to Saturday.

“I know just talking to one of the NHL officials here, that was probably one of their biggest concerns was how to get everybody through the testing every day,” DeBoer said. “So far, so good. The results, I think, have been good, too.”

The Knights also have daily symptom and temperature checks through CLEAR technology. The company, which also has a service that lets users bypass airport security lines, has an app in which players can enter whether they have any symptoms. It also has a large amount of kiosks set up that take players’ temperatures remotely.

If a player passes on both counts, he gets a green bar on his app that says he is free to move about the bubble for 12 hours.

Players aren’t the only ones who have to go through the process. Everyone who has even limited exposure to players needs to be tested daily. That includes people such as hotel bartenders, the Rogers Place ice crew, the public address announcer and the housekeeping staff.

Commissioner Gary Bettman estimated in May that the NHL could use 25,000 to 30,000 tests during the postseason at a cost of “millions of dollars.”

“We’ve got an extensive process in place to streamline (everything) and put everyone in the secure zone through testing on a daily basis,” said Dr. Willem Meeuwisse, the NHL’s chief medical officer. “Everyone who’s got any exposure in the hub is going to be very tightly monitored and regularly tested.”

Playoff beard

Left wing Jonathan Marchessault started growing his playoff beard early during quarantine, but sported a trimmed look on his Zoom call with the media Wednesday. But he doesn’t expect his beard to stay trimmed for long.

”I just expect (to keep) growing it out for a while, so I just wanted to step back a little bit,” Marchessault said. “Don’t worry, it’s going to come back. It’s coming back soon.

Contact Ben Gotz at bgotz@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BenSGotz on Twitter.