Cape Breton’s Colten Ellis surprises young cancer patient with goalie stick

Colten Ellis of the Buffalo Sabres is being praised for a touching gesture to a young cancer warrior from Cape Breton.

Cape Breton’s Colten Ellis is having a good rookie season with the National Hockey League’s Buffalo Sabres, but stopping some of the NHL’s biggest stars isn’t the only way he’s making an impact.

Daniel Klaes and his 14-year-old daughter Shaylee live just outside of Buffalo and are big Sabres fans.

The teen was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a form of bone cancer, in May 2024.

“She’s undergone numerous surgeries in her leg and her lung,” Klaes said. “She basically has a whole new right leg.”

Not long ago, Shaylee met Buffalo’s rookie goalie at a laser-tag event put on by an area hospital.

“Colten participated in that and was on Shaylee’s team,” Daniel Klaes said. “They got to talking and they were playing video games together, and he was just a really nice guy.”

A couple of weeks later, Klaes and his daughter went to a Sabres game.

While the River Denys, N.S., native wasn’t in the Buffalo lineup that night, he did have a surprise for young Shaylee.

“Somehow, word got to him that Shaylee was in the stands,” her father said.

“He made his way down to the ice, and next thing you know, they’re taking down a pane of glass in the middle of the intermission. Out he walks up into the stands with one of his goalie sticks and presented it to Shaylee,” he said.

“You should have seen the look on her face.”

Ellis’s kind act is no surprise to his former coach with the Cape Breton West Islanders.

“Colten has always been a better person than he is a goaltender, and he’s a pretty incredible goaltender,” said Kyle Gillies, who was an assistant coach with the major midget team the year Ellis and the Islanders won the Telus Cup, in 2016-17.

Gillies added that people in the area have been following Ellis’ success with the Sabres.

“When Colten succeeds, it lifts up everybody around here,” he said. “Families, minor hockey programs and young athletes all feel that connection.”

Heading into Tuesday’s game in Edmonton against the Oilers, Ellis had a record of four wins and three losses.

Back in Buffalo, Klaes said his daughter is currently in remission, and she might have a new favourite Sabres player.

“Go Colten,” he said. “We’re all rooting for you here in Buffalo, and I think he’s going to be the one that can turn it around for us here.”

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