Matthew Mayich is still in the hospital after collapsing during an Aug. 20 outdoor workout in Tempe, a sudden turn that has put ASU Football under fresh scrutiny. The 21-year-old sophomore defenseman was rushed to a local hospital and, according to his lawyer, remains incapacitated with a recovery that is highly unlikely.
The news lands hard because the workout was not an isolated session. Arizona State University said it was a morning team event with coaches, training staff and a third party who had previously worked with the ASU Hockey team present, and that the school is now reviewing every circumstance around the workout and the policies, procedures and training protocols tied to it. James Rund is leading that review, while Coach Powers and other Sun Devil Athletics staff are continuing to support hockey student-athletes during the process.
What makes the case especially difficult is the setting. Temperatures in Tempe reached 106 degrees on Aug. 20, though officials said the workout did not take place during the hottest part of the day. ASU also said it has heat-illness guidelines informed by the National Athletic Trainers’ Association and that its student-athletes regularly practice and train outside under coach and trainer supervision. Those details help explain how the session was framed, but they do not answer the more important question of why a player in a supervised workout collapsed so severely.
Dr. Frank LoVecchio said training in extreme heat is very hard even for elite, highly conditioned athletes. He said the average person, even athletes, cannot make it in that kind of heat without assistance, and that body temperature can rise very quickly. That warning now hangs over the review as ASU weighs what happened, who was present and whether its existing safeguards were enough.
For Mayich, the immediate story is not the investigation but the condition that followed the workout. For ASU, the next step is a review meant to collect and assess information carefully and respectfully, with the school saying it will take the time needed before drawing conclusions. Until that process ends, the central gap remains the one everyone is waiting to see filled: what happened inside that workout to leave a young defenseman incapacitated and still hospitalized.
