Hockey Hall of Fame says it is considering the Chicago Blackhawks’ request to remove Brad Aldrich’s name from the Stanley Cup — while the NHL opts not to punish Kevin Cheveldayoff

The Chicago Blackhawks have asked the Hockey Hall of Fame to remove Brad Aldrich’s name from the Stanley Cup, the team on Friday confirmed to the Tribune.

Blackhawks Chairman Rocky Wirtz made the request in a letter to Hockey Hall of Fame Chairman Lanny McDonald.

In response to the Tribune’s inquiry if the Hockey Hall of Fame would honor Wirtz’s request to remove Aldrich’s name, the Hall said in a statement:

“Hockey Hall of Fame Chair, Lanny McDonald, spoke with NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly today regarding the request from the Chicago Blackhawks to have Brad Aldrich’s name removed from the Stanley Cup. The parties agree that this request is appropriate and that they will have further dialogue, including with the Stanley Cup trustees, on how best to effectuate this request.”

A spokeswoman for the Hockey Hall of Fame said no name has been removed from the Stanley Cup.

The Cup contains some spelling errors (Black Hawk Pete Palangio appears twice on the 1938 Cup, once correctly and again incorrectly as “Palagio”), while others have been corrected, such as Blackhawks winger Kris Versteeg, who originally was stamped as “Vertseeg” on the 2010 Cup.

Aldrich’s name is one of 52 from the 2009-10 Hawks that are stamped on the fourth barrel ring of the silver-and-nickel alloy trophy, which stands 35¼ inches high and weighs 37 pounds.

Wirtz’s letter was the latest effort by the Blackhawks to rectify the team’s actions — or lack thereof — in 2010. An independent report by Chicago law firm Jenner & Block gave a scathing review of the team’s handling of former player Kyle Beach’s sexual assault allegation against Aldrich, who was the video coach at the time.

The report suggested Hawks management failed to act on Beach’s complaint to not distract from the team’s playoff run, which culminated in the Hawks winning the first of what would be three championships in a six-season span. According to the report, Blackhawks senior management met May 23, 2010, to discuss the allegation but took no action until after the season.

Wirtz notes how three generations of Wirtzes — including Arthur M. Wirtz, Arthur Jr. and himself — are engraved on various Cups among the Hawks’ six championships.

“Each engraving, whether it is my grandfather’s name, my uncle’s or mine, carries a sense of reverence, respect and humility,” Rocky Wirtz wrote. “No other trophy of sport compares to the Stanley Cup and what it represents: hard work, perseverance, sacrifice, athleticism and teamwork. For the Chicago Blackhawks, no words can describe the pride in winning the trophy.”

However, Wirtz pivoted to the findings of the Jenner & Block report “commissioned by us to get to the bottom of allegations of serious misconduct during the 2009-10 season.”

“While the behavior of our front-office staff who were alerted to this incident was inexplicable and wrong, the behavior of the video coach was unforgivable, and led to his removal from the Blackhawks organization,” Wirtz wrote.

Wirtz noted Aldrich’s 2013 misdemeanor conviction for criminal sexual conduct with a 16-year-old high school hockey player in Michigan and Aldrich’s listing in the sex offender registry.

Wirtz summed up by writing: “Aldrich’s involvement with the team during the 2010 season has cast a pall on the players’ extraordinary work that year. The names of some of hockey’s most talented athletes appear on the Stanley Cup. But so does the name ‘Brad Aldrich,’ whose role as video coach made him eligible for the engraving. His conduct disqualified him, however, and it was a mistake to submit his name. We are sorry we allowed it to happen.”

According to Hockey Hall of Fame records, Aldrich took the Cup to his hometown, Houghton, Mich., on Sept. 14, 2010, and on Sept. 20 the Cup went through a five-day engraving process.

Aldrich’s name is etched between then-skills coach Paul Vincent and Marc Bergevin, who was Hawks director of player personnel.

Vincent, who now coaches elite prospects in Cape Cod, has been a vocal critic of the Hawks and Aldrich and offered himself as a witness for Beach’s negligence lawsuit against the team.

Asked about the irony of his name appearing next to Aldrich’s, Vincent told the Tribune this summer it “just kind of blows your mind.

“It is what it is,” Vincent said. “It just gets to you after a while because you don’t know what to say.”

Vincent spoke with the Tribune again Friday and said, “You know what, his name never should’ve been on it. They knew what he did.

“I understand winning is important, but it should never take precedence over what happened to Kyle. ... If they remove (Aldrich’s name), that’s a great thing.”

Bergevin, now general manager of the Montreal Canadiens, said in June that he was “not aware” of any allegations concerning Aldrich. He was not named in Jenner & Block’s report.

Joel Quenneville, the Hawks coach for their three Stanley Cups from 2010-2015, had said he wasn’t aware of the allegations until this summer, but he promptly resigned as Florida Panthers coach Thursday shortly after meeting with NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman. Quenneville was with the Hawks from 2008-09 until his firing in early in the 2018-19 season. He is the second-winningest coach in NHL history.

Stan Bowman served his first season as general manager in 2010, and he resigned his position as president of hockey operations and GM shortly before Rocky Wirtz, son and team CEO Danny Wirtz and Jenner & Block lead investigator Reid Schar revealed the review’s findings to the public in an online briefing.

Al MacIsaac, another senior manager from 2010, was ousted as Hawks senior vice president of hockey operations this week.

On the Cup, Bowman and MacIsaac’s names precede Kevin Cheveldayoff, the assistant general manager during that 2010 championship season.

Cheveldayoff, now the Winnipeg Jets general manager, met with Bettman on Friday.

But the NHL decided not to take any action against Cheveldayoff, saying in a statement he was “not responsible for the improper decisions” made by the Blackhawks regarding Aldrich.

“While on some level, it would be easiest to paint everyone with any association to this terrible matter with the same broad brush, I believe that fundamental fairness requires a more in-depth analysis of the role of each person,” Bettman said in a statement. “Kevin Cheveldayoff was not a member of the Blackhawks senior leadership team in 2010, and I cannot, therefore, assign to him responsibility for the club’s actions, or inactions. He provided a full account of his degree of involvement in the matter, which was limited exclusively to his attendance at a single meeting, and I found him to be extremely forthcoming and credible in our discussion.”

In his own statement released through the Jets, Cheveldayoff expressed “my support of and empathy for Kyle Beach and all he has had to endure since 2010. He was incredibly brave coming forward to tell his story. We can all use his courage as an inspiration to do a better job of making hockey a safer space for anyone who wants to play the game.”

Cheveldayoff also expressed gratitude for the opportunity to meet Bettman in person “and directly share my role in and recollection of events while I was assistant GM of the Chicago Blackhawks in 2010.”

According to the Associated Press, Beach will meet with Bettman and NHL Players Association executive director Donald Fehr via separate video calls Saturday.

Fehr apologized Thursday for the NHLPA failing to take action when Beach notified the union’s player-assistance program in 2010.

The Blackhawks still have two pending lawsuits against them — Beach’s and another by a former Houghton (Mich.) High School hockey player that Aldrich in 2013 pleaded guilty to having criminal sexual contact with before registering as a sex offender in Michigan.

The Wirtzes said they would instruct their legal team to negotiate with attorney Susan Loggans, who represents both plaintiffs, on a “fair resolution” for Beach early next week.

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