Flyers' Shayne Gostisbehere to host Stoneman Douglas hockey team

Philadelphia's Shayne Gostisbehere, who attended Marjory Stoneman Douglas High for two years, will have some special guests in the stands Sunday afternoon when the Flyers meet the Florida Panthers in Sunrise, Florida.

Gostisbehere has invited the school's hockey team, which won the Lightning High School Hockey League Tier 1 state title on Feb. 25, to attend Sunday's game and will meet with the players beforehand.

While he didn't play for Stoneman Douglas, he said he admires how the players handled themselves after the Feb. 14 shooting at the school that killed 17, including 14 students.

"I thought it was pretty cool," Gostisbehere said of Stoneman Douglas winning the state title, according to The (Doylestown, Pa.) Intelligencer. "Obviously the circumstances are a little rough.

"Just to see how they won it, they didn't win a game in the round robin and then they came back. ... The way they handled themselves, it was pretty cool to see."

A native of Pembroke Pines, Florida, Gostisbehere attended Stoneman Douglas for two years before moving to Connecticut to play a higher level of competition than was available at the scholastic level at home.

But Stoneman Douglas is still home to Gostisbehere. He told reporters that his grandparents live just a mile from the school, and he said he knew assistant football coach Aaron Feis, who was killed while trying to shield students during the shooting.

After winning the championship, the Stoneman Douglas players brought their medals back to the school for a memorial service for the victims, and Gostisbehere said he thought "they handled themselves like adults."

For a few hours on Sunday, Gostisbehere says he hopes his guests can enjoy a bit of a diversion.

"It will be cool to see them," he said. "[And, hopefully] just get their minds off everything they've been going through."