PAWTUCKET, R.I. (WHDH) - Hockey coach Sam DaCosta is grieving. His former player Aidan Dorgan was tragically killed when gunfire broke out at the Lynch Arena in Pawtucket.
“It’s unbelievable,” DaCosta said. “It’s devastating. There’s no other word for it. Aidan was unbelievably hardworking, it was impressive.”
Dorgan played for DaCosta his junior and senior year at North Providence High School.
“Aidan was the kind of player you wanted on your team, in your room for sure,” DaCosta said. “He was very friendly, energetic kid. He was always making his teammates laugh and he did an amazing job of towing that line of being a teammate’s guy and all someone the coaching staff was able to rely on as well.”
Dorgan was a star athlete. He wrote a profile about his hockey life, hoping to be recruited to play in college, saying “I wish to develop a relationship with coaches and show them that I’m a hard working, coachable defenseman that can play both sides of the ice.”
Dorgan would go on to attend Merrimack College, where he would study mechanical engineering. A school spokesperson told 7NEWS, “He was a deeply valued member of our campus community and a bright student who was heavily involved in the School of Engineering and Computational Sciences.”
Friends say Dorgan was engaged and loved his family. He was at the ice rink Monday to cheer on his youngest brother. Police say his dad, Robert Dorgan, also known as Roberta Esposito, showed up with two guns and began shooting.
One of the first people to assist the victims said Aidan covered his mother Rhonda, trying to protect her from getting shot. Both of them lost their lies.
“Its indicative of who he was, he was a protective person,” DaCosta said.
A young man with so much ahead of him, gone too soon.
“Anytime you shake a kid’s hand at the end of their career, you hope they go on to rally bright and happy things and they have a chance to experience the world and this is absolutely the worse thing you can imagine,” DaCosta said.
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