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By day, Brett Stephens lives the routine professional life of a family dentist, filling cavities, performing root canals, capping teeth. By night, he's the team dentist for the Utah Grizzlies.

A hockey dentist.

It's the difference between selling new Porsches on the showroom floor and tearing engine parts out of beat-up Buicks in an auto-salvage yard.

And he loves it.

"It can be frightening," he says. "During a game, I think, 'Watch the high sticks, watch the puck, don't get in a fight.' "

Don't ruin or re-ruin the great work he does.

Grizzlies players, of course, pay no mind to what the good doctor says. They skate and power and fight and bleed on. They stop in for emergency dental work in the trainer's room long enough for the tires or teeth to be rotated and get back on the track.

In a grand spectrum of forces that do not coexist well, proper dental health would be on one end and hockey on the opposite. Stephens has been the team's dentist for three years now, and filled in as an assistant for five years before that. He attends home games, he's right there with them at every turn, in the locker room before and after, treating players on the Grizzlies and, as a part of the deal, opposing teams, too.

The carnage he's witnessed should not be seen by anyone without a strong constitution and clinical training. On this occasion, he offers to show pictures, and the offer is happily declined.

Knuckling through blood is his business.

If there's a busted or loosened tooth, he's on the scene. If there's a cut in or around the mouth, he stitches them up. If there's a broken row of teeth and a fractured jaw, he does what he can and guides the player through appropriate procedures.

Stephens has done all of the above, all while, in the only slightly less severe cases, the coach waits for the return of the players so they can finish their shifts on the ice.

"They're just grateful to get back in the game," Stephens says. "They say it's their reward for all the work they put in."

Although he feels like a member of the Grizz, and team officials make him feel that way, his dentistry training covers both teams, with an ECHL contractual obligation to help the opponent. Stephens takes satisfaction in that, too.

During a recent contest against the Rapid City Rush, one of the Rush skaters took a stick to the mouth, opening a five-centimeter gash. "It was a huge cut, super deep," Stephens says. He numbed and stitched the wound and that same player subsequently went out and scored two of the Rush's three goals to beat the Grizzlies.

A player's blood is red, no matter what color jersey he wears.

"These guys are incredible athletes," he says. "They are brave. At this level, they skate fast with pucks, bodies, sticks flying around. The fights keep me busy. They get their lips split or their faces cut. They get cross-checked or hit into the boards and their faces are exposed. I have so much respect for these players. With their schedule, it's like playing three football games a week. They have a lot of the same pads, the helmet. But because they don't have face masks, the mouth is exposed to injury."

Stephens makes custom mouthpieces for each of the Grizzlies players, but sometimes that's not enough. There have been moments when he repairs damage early in the first period of a game, and the damage is unrepaired in the third by way of the brute force that's just part of pro hockey.

It's the grand spectrum.

"The worst injury I've seen was when one of our players had his jaw broken by a slap shot," Stephens says. "He was in front of the net, had his back to the goal, the puck came off a stick as a player in front of him moved and the puck hit him in the lower jaw. We had to rush him to the E.R., stabilize him and get him to an oral surgeon."

Stephens removed three of the player's teeth and later the player had a bone graft done. Stephens built him a "flipper," which is a retainer with false teeth on it, until the player could have implants put in a year or so later.

"These guys play through pain," he says. "They're tough."

And so is the man who fixes them. Stephens, who played basketball, football and baseball at East High School and graduated from the University of Utah, went to dental school in Oregon before returning to build his practice in Holladay. When a friend asked him to help out with the Grizzlies, Stephens wouldn't have known a power play from a Broadway play. But over the past eight years, he's become a student of the game, as he's tended the wounds.

Grizzlies coach and general manager Tim Branham says Stephens is as much a part of the club as anyone: "[He's] crucial to the success of our team. Not only is it important during a game to get players back as quick as possible, but also the professionalism in which Brett treats our players is imperative for the comfort of our boys. They need someone they can trust, and Brett does an amazing job."

Stephens signs an annual contract with the Grizzlies, all as he continues his regular practice. Before working with the Grizz, Stephens was the team dentist for Skyline High School football, but that was minimal compared to this.

"Sports dentistry appeals to me," he says. "I feel like I am a part of the team."

He's the MVP of the team when teeth are busted, cuts are opened, and engine parts have to be hauled out of the old Buick.

GORDON MONSON hosts "The Big Show" with Spence Checketts weekdays from 3-7 p.m. on 97.5 FM and 1280 AM The Zone. Twitter: @GordonMonson.