Kings' Aisha Visram becomes first woman to work behind NHL bench
The Los Angeles Kings smashed the Pittsburgh Penguins 6-2 at home on Thursday night, but the game's biggest event had nothing to do with the final scoreline.
Per Dan O'Leary and Dan Greenspan of the NHL's website, Aisha Visram made history Thursday by working behind the Kings bench for the win. In the process, she became the first woman to serve behind a club bench in any capacity for a league contest, according to the Professional Hockey Athletic Trainers Society.
Visram is the head athletic trainer for the Ontario Reign of the American Hockey League but was called into duty in Los Angeles because the Kings were short-staffed due to COVID-19 issues. Previously, she served as trainer for the St. Lawrence University men's and women's hockey teams from 2012-17 before moving on to work for the Adirondack Thunder of the East Coast Hockey League from 2017-2020.
The Reign shared a video of Visram discussing her career on Thursday evening.
"That's incredible. That's great. We need more of that in our game. I can tell you that Aisha is a big part of our organization," Kings coach Todd McLellan said of Visram's achievement. "And we don't talk about these people. We don't talk about the trainers or the equipment people, but she's mentoring with [head athletic trainer] Chris Kingsley and the rest of the staff, and accepted a huge role there and does a tremendous job, so unreal reward for her. And everybody's a big part of it, so include her in it."
The Kings next play at the Seattle Kraken on Saturday night.
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