NEW YORK — Mike Richter, the once mighty goalie, wandered around Montreal, unable to process what a McGill University doctor had just told him: that she wouldn’t clear him to play hockey. The then-36-year-old had suffered a concussion in November 2002, half a year earlier. That concussion was his second in eight months, and he also sustained a fractured skull on the first one, the result of a slap shot to the head.
Before the injury, Richter believed he had three, four, maybe even five years left of hockey in him. But that assessment in Montreal ended those hopes. He wandered to a nearby park and grabbed a bite to eat, processing the doctor’s words. His world seemed completely different walking out of the office than when he walked in. At that moment, the simple act of calling his wife felt too difficult.
“I couldn’t mouth the words: ‘Hey, it’s over,’” he said.
Richter’s identity was about to change. In September 2003, less than a year removed from his final injury, he officially retired. The New York Rangers raised his No. 35 into the rafters that season. He was first in franchise history in wins (301) at the time of retirement and the goaltender who carried New York to a Stanley Cup win in 1994. He was a franchise legend but also lost — a man at a life crossroads attempting to regain his health after a trying series of injuries.
Mike Richter wipes away a tear during a news conference announcing his retirement on Sept. 4, 2003, in New York. (Mario Tama / Getty Images)
Richter believes he would have been better equipped to handle retirement at age 22 than at age 36. By his 30s, he’d invested so many hours into hockey. The sport had planted itself at the center of his life. And then it was gone.
“It is like a death,” Richter said. “That’s who you were, and you are no longer that.”
The death of one career led to the birth of another, though. Richter was always interested in the world beyond his sport, and that took him to Yale University and into the renewable energy field. Thirty summers after lifting the Stanley Cup, he’s the president of Brightcore Energy, a company aimed at saving clients money while diminishing their environmental footprints.
He’s found his post-playing career purpose.
“In the world,” he said, “you have to keep reinventing yourself.”
The path to reinvention wasn’t simple. While recovering from his 2002 concussion, Richter found himself exhausted by 10-minute walks along the Hudson River — a far cry from his NHL-level workouts. He likened his symptoms to feeling hungover and jetlagged at the same time. Bright lights and loud noises were difficult to handle. He simultaneously felt tired but couldn’t sleep.
“It was a horror show,” he said.
The long recovery process, in a way, helped him shift his focus. He had young kids, whom he leaned on “in a way they don’t even recognize.” Simply getting his health back became the most important thing, not getting back on the ice. He just wanted to feel like himself again.
That happened gradually. Concussions aren’t like knee or shoulder injuries, for which there are specific timelines. Recovery isn’t linear. But as Richter improved physically, his mental state did, too.
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During that stretch, he started applying to schools, aiming to finish the undergraduate degree he began in the 1980s at University of Wisconsin. Yale accepted him as part of a program for non-traditional students “with exceptional backgrounds and aspirations,” and he enrolled in 2004. While in New Haven, Conn., he joined the club biking team and also spent four seasons as a volunteer assistant with the university’s hockey team.
Yale gave Richter a sense of direction during a time of transition. And though he still didn’t know exactly what he would do after graduating, he had an easy answer when someone asked what he was doing in retirement: He was back in school.
“It was a good segue,” he said.
Richter’s college experience was far different from most of his younger classmates’. He didn’t stay on campus, instead living with his family in a small house in Guilford, Conn., by the coast. His free time, which revolved around raising his kids, looked far different than that of the younger students. Most people on campus didn’t know his NHL background, and if they found out, “they didn’t give a hoot,” he said.
His age led to some unusual and at times humorous interactions. Once, when Richter arrived early to class, a student started to ask the former goalie about missing an upcoming class. That’s when it hit Richter: The kid thought he was the professor.
Overall, though, the age gap was, in his words, “surprisingly not odd.” He found he melted into the community around him and graduated with a major in Ethics, Politics, and Economics — “you get a smattering of everything and how it interacts,” he said — and a minor in environmental policy. He had enrolled with an interest in the environment.
“This is the air we breathe, this is the water we drink, this is the limited resources we either have or don’t have,” he said. “We better figure it out and figure it out right, fast. Because everybody’s got a stake.”
Now, Richter has been out of professional hockey as long as he was in it — a bewildering thought, he said. His second act has led him to Brightcore, where he’s been president since 2016, shortly after its 2015 founding. He had already been working in the environmental field and met the two founders, both of whom had experience on Wall Street and in clean energy, through a mutual connection.
Brightcore provides clean energy solutions aimed at helping clients reduce reliance on fossil fuels. Recently, it worked with Bard College to install a geothermal heating and cooling project in the library, replacing what the university described as a “fossil fuel-fired system.”
“These are not easy things to put in, but done well they’re really robust and resilient and quite quiet,” Richter said of the Bard project. “It’s like we were never there once the sod goes down. It’s a pretty impressive transformation.”
Brightcore, which Richter said has around 120 employees, also works with other energy forms, including solar and LED lighting.
The day to day for Richter, who expressed interest in running for political office in the past and hasn’t ruled it out in the future, includes lots of phone and video calls with clients. He primarily focuses on business development and sales, but as a company leader, he also aims to keep employees motivated. He finds most come into the work highly driven because they recognize the importance of the environment’s future.
Mike Richter waves to Rangers fans during Henrik Lundqvist’s jersey retirement ceremony in January 2022 at Madison Square Garden. (Steven Ryan / Getty Images)
Despite his busy work life, Richter keeps the Rangers — and hockey in general — near the top of his mind. He catches as many regular-season games as he can and he’ll watch any playoff games on TV, regardless of team. Since 2014, the Mike Richter Award has been given to the most outstanding regular-season goalie in men’s college hockey. In Richter’s free time, he plays in a men’s league. He’s still a fan of the sport.
As a player, Richter wanted to make the most of the opportunity he had, to maximize all of his potential. Now he’s with a different type of team, trying to do the same in his new sphere of work.
“It’s fascinating to go from one world to another,” he said. “I feel like there’s a larger, meaningful need that you’re addressing. … If you can make the world a little bit better, great.”
(Top photos: Getty Images)
