BOSTON (AP) — The Boston Bruins will wait to retire pioneering Black hockey player Willie O’Ree’s number until next year so that they can raise his No. 22 banner to the rafters with fans in the building. The NHL said it asked the Bruins and O’Ree to postpone the ceremony until Jan. 18 — 64 years to the day that he became the league’s first Black player. It had been scheduled for next Thursday night before a game against the New Jersey Devils. O’Ree became the first Black player in the NHL when he took the ice for Boston against the Montreal Canadiens on Jan. 18, 1958.
