Two offseason surgeries delayed Brady Arneson's season debut until February. After a strong Development Camp and finally healthy, the Chicago Steel forward is out to show what he can do in the 2024-25 season.
Two offseason surgeries delayed Brady Arneson's season debut until February. After a strong Development Camp and finally healthy, the Chicago Steel forward is out to show what he can do in the 2024-25 season.
Getting out of bed, bending over to pick something up, and even walking. All of the mundane tasks that fill up our day that we take for granted; this was Brady Arneson's recovery.
Ahead of his second USHL season, the Chicago Steel forward underwent two surgeries within three weeks, essentially sidelining him for the foreseeable future. Despite the setback, Arneson knew he had to prioritize his health. He had been playing through pain since his rookie season and had been walking with a limp off the ice.
Despite the challenging road to recovery, the forward understood that his well-being came first, even if it meant temporarily stepping back from hockey.
In early August 2023, he had hip surgery followed by a periacetabular osteotomy (PAO) shortly before the Steel's preseason opener. The first surgery involved a labrum repair, a standard procedure for hip issues. The latter was a more complex operation, involving cutting and reorienting the bone around the acetabulum and then reattaching it to the pelvis with screws.
"I was rehabbing the whole summer," Arneson told The Hockey News. "They told me probably a year to get back on the ice. I couldn't walk at the time, so I needed (the surgery) just for my lifestyle at that point. I got the surgeries, and three months it took me to learn to walk again."
Arneson made remarkable progress in his recovery, thanks in part to his family's unwavering encouragement to get him to the gym on days when motivation was lacking. Added, current and former teammates from Chicago, as well as the Sioux Falls Power, periodically checked in on him.
The Red Wing, Minnesota native shockingly resumed skating in just five months, smashing his initial projected recovery timeline. Arneson rejoined his Steel teammates in mid-January for practices and was cleared for game action in early February. In his first game back, after nearly 300 days since his last game, Arneson buried a no-look feed from Grayden Slipec into a wide-open net and was immediately greeted by his teammates.
"That was a really special moment for me," he said. "I don't think my teammates could have been happier for me either. I think that's the best thing I could have asked for. I have teammates who love and look up to me coming back from something like that. It was really special moment."
Arneson scored his second goal of the shortened season just five games later. As the regular season was coming to a close, he started to look more and more comfortable. Consequently, his shot totals increased in the final month, and he scored two more times in the last four games.
Given the circumstances, it was the best anyone could have hoped for. And while nobody hopes to have such a long road to recovery, Arneson's silver lining was that he was able to watch a lot of film, study the ways in which he played, and form a plan of attack when he was ready to resume playing.
"I always thought it was kind of cliche when people say, 'You come out better than you went in,'" Arneson said. "After going through it, I kind of see what they mean. I had, I think it was, what was it, nine months? I had nine months to reflect on my first season in Chicago and try to analyze how I did things, how I played, and stuff like that.
"When you can't get out of bed, there's plenty of time to watch film and learn new things. I think, coming back from the surgeries, it changes the way you play and the way you see the game. It was definitely a good thing for me."
After the season ended, Arneson took a two-week break before starting more rehab and workouts for the summer. Rather than moving on to the University of Maine next year, he will take a third year in the USHL. He participated in the Chicago Steel's Development Camp and stood out as a top performer during the weekend's scrimmages.
This was the first time in a long while that Arneson felt 100 percent healthy, and it clearly showed in his performance. Added, he had rediscovered his speed.
"The speed has been coming," he said. "The hip I had work on, my whole life that hip had 25 percent of the coverage you're supposed to have. So, every stride, push-off, or whatever on the ice, I'm only getting 25 percent of what I put into it structurally. Now, I'm getting 100 percent; can't get much better than that.
"Getting on the ice, you feel amazing. I'm sure for some other guys, it just feels normal. Going through that, you get back on the ice after some time off, and then you feel amazing. You're so thankful for it.
"I had some moments towards the end of the year where I burned a couple of guys in games. It's definitely been a while. The thing is, you don't realize you're having problems until you're able to look back at it and realize, 'Oh, you know, I haven't been healthy for a while.' It just took a while to realize that, and now, I can't be more thankful for being healthy."