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It turns out that the Blue who wound up with a discipline issue from last night’s 2-1 overtime victor was Robert Bortuzzo.
St. Louis’ Robert Bortuzzo fined $3,091.40, the maximum allowable under the CBA, for cross-checking Boston’s Jordan Szwarz.
— NHL Player Safety (@NHLPlayerSafety) March 22, 2018
Obviously, this is not the one that people expected, if you were one of the people expecting something to come out of Brayden Schenn’s hit on David Krejci.
Schenn has been suspended for charging twice, once in 2016 in a hit on T.J. Oshie (three games), and once in 2012 for a hit on Anton Volchenkov (one game). Last night Schenn got a two minute minor for charging and that was that.
The NBCSN intermission desk weighed in, and neither Mike Milbury nor Jeremy Roenick believed that Schenn deserved a suspension:
The argument was that Krejci had his head down, so therefore Schenn didn’t intentionally target his head. Also, Schenn did not leave his feet before contact was made.
Jeremy Rutherford states that the NHL viewed the hit the same way as JR and Milbury:
Schenn will NOT face supplemental discipline for hit on Krejci. The league reviewed it and felt it was not charging, saying Schenn’s skates were still on the ice at the point of contact. They looked at illegal hit to the head but felt with Krejci’s positioning, it was unavoidable
— Jeremy Rutherford (@jprutherford) March 22, 2018
Some Bruins fans are upset that Schenn didn’t get called not because it was charging, but because David Backes was recently ejected for this high and late hit on Vincent Trocheck (enjoy the NESN broadcast crew):
So is it ok then that Schenn didn’t get a major/supplemental discipline because Backes shouldn’t’ve gotten one and therefore his ejection was bull, or was Backes’ ejection warranted because Schenn should’ve gotten a major? Now I’m just as confused as to how fans determine discipline as I am with how the Department of Player Safety determines these things.
I freely admit that regardless of whether the decision for no further discipline was right or not, that if someone did that to one of our players I’d be displeased - at both the offending player and at our guy for having his head down.