Veteran National Hockey League center Keith Primeau of the Philadelphia Flyers has announced he is retiring after 15 seasons.
The 34-year-old Primeau is effectively being forced out of the game because of lingering effects of a concussion he suffered last October. The blow sidelined him most of last season and he has not received medical clearance to return to the ice.
One of the taller players in the league at one meter, 96 centimeters, Primeau began his professional ice hockey career with the Detroit Red Wings. He also played for the Hartford Whalers and Carolina Hurricanes before joining Philadelphia in 1999. He was named captain of the Flyers in 2001.
In 909 NHL regular season games, Primeau scored 266 goals, had 353 assists and 1541 penalty minutes. He appeared in two All-Star games (1999 and 2004) and played for Canada at the 1998 Nagano Olympics.
Primeau is in the record book for ending the longest game in modern NHL history. He scored the game winning goal in the fifth overtime period to lead Philadelphia to a victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins in playoff Game Four of the 2000 Eastern Conference Semifinals.