Breaking down the Leafs & Canucks’ violent third period

Photo Credit: John E. Sokolowski/USA TODAY SPORTS

The Toronto Maple Leafs played a great game of run-and-gun hockey last night. They put six pucks into the back of the net and are now the clear leaders in every single offensive metric other than goals for; in fact, they’re on pace to be the most eager offensive team of the past decade.

But that’s not the story of last night’s game. The story is the fits of rage that ensued. So let’s go through all of these, one by one.

Until the mid-late point of the third period, this game was actually pretty calm. The Leafs were outshooting and outscoring the Canucks, and everybody in Toronto was having a grand ol’ time. But then Morgan Rielly threw a heavy hit on Jannik Hansen, and seconds later, Nazem Kadri put his body into Daniel Sedin’s.

That’s where the wheels came off. Daniel’s shot was in the net, but he was on the ground with his helmet off. Hansen, already furious about being toppled seconds before, came to the defense of his linemate.

This morning, the NHL ruled that Kadri wouldn’t face a hearing or any sort of punishment for the hit, much to the outrage of everyone in Vancouver and most neutral parties. Honestly, it’s hard to blame them.

There are two different angles that we have of the hit. One of them, it looks like Kadri catches the shoulder first. The other, it looks like Kadri cuts in front of the shoulder and gets the body. That makes a big difference to the Department of Player Safety; VP Damian Echevarrieta noted that blindside hits aren’t directly illegal, and require the head to be the initial point of contact. As Pierre Lebrun pointed out, Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekalainen fought hard for all blindside hits to be punishable months ago, but his efforts were shot down.

Technically speaking, that makes giving Kadri punishment beyond his five-minute charging major an incredibly difficult task. After all, conclusive evidence is needed to punish him under the rule, and based on the angles that the broadcast gave us, they weren’t there.

But that seems like a fault of the rule more than anything. If Kadri managed to graze his shoulder first, it doesn’t change the fact that he came in from a long distance, through the blind side, and that 90% of his impact was delivered to the head. By the book, it might be too gray to use in the rule pallette. But that means that the book needs some reviewing; if we stop pinching and loopholes and take the hit for what it was as a sum, that’s a hit that shouldn’t be in the game anymore, and fits most of the requirements of a multi-game suspension. Needless to say, Kadri likely dodged a bullet here, especially as a repeat offender who may have seen a hefty punishment had it fit the requirements.

The two sides weren’t pleased to leave it at just that. Derek Dorsett and Matt Martin had been yapping at each other throughout the game, and it finally culminated… in Dorsett going after Komarov. Martin, as you can see, was not very amused, and started yelling at the Canucks enforcer after all was said and done.

First off, shoutout to cooler heads prevailing here. The linesman did a spectacular job getting Dorsett the hell off the ice before he could go charge the Leafs bench to have the fight he was avoiding the entire game. Meanwhile, Martin knew to only go as far off the bench as one leg; say what you will about him being a David Clarkson-esque signing, he’s still only here for half the dollars, half the years, falls half as often, and, as you can see, knew to stop at half way towards an automatic 10 game suspension.

Also, Komarov through this entire thing is the best. He gets close enough to holding his own during the fight, yaps a bit, but mostly has a massive grin every step of the way. Leo forever.

Despite neither of these two being enforcers, this fight was pretty pre-meditated. In fact, the origins of it come on the same shift as the Kadri hit. As you can see here, Burrows flails his stick in Rielly’s direction as he skates by after knocking over Hansen. It’s hard to conclusively confirm its an attempt to make contact, but as you can see, it’s there:

What isn’t hard to see is the flying spear that Burrows gives Rielly a few minutes later. Eventually, they get to yapping, and then wrestle at centre ice. 

Burrows avoided discipline as well, which I suppose is fair for the wrong reasons with Kadri getting off scott-free. Both the bench incident and the spear should be non-starters in any other case, though; if not a suspension, certainly fines should be in order. But, in the madness of this game, they got de-prioritized.

Remember how I have Matt Martin some credit after the chirp-fest with Dorsett? He loses a bit of it here. On the same shift were Babcock told him to “make sure there’s no trouble”, he starts the trouble. After more skilled players in Kadri, Komarov, and Rielly got out of their own messes, he started the biggest one of the bunch.

Not that Martin is an awful player, but when you give someone a tough guy role, these are the things that end up happening in the moment. To his credit, he admitted that things went “a little over the top”, but here we were, watching him wail on rookie Troy Stetcher after a hit and a shove. Now, you know how that’s going to make Ryan Miller feel, given his history of being around in moments involving players getting jumped. 

It becomes pandemonium from there. Ben Hutton and Brandon Sutter make a panicked rush to the corner knowing Toronto’s heavyweight is fighting their starting goaltender. Frederik Andersen waltzes over to see if he can help by having a distractive conversation to even up the numbers. Auston Matthews knows that Sven Baertschi isn’t going to do anything serious and follows him for a while, before grabbing onto Ben Hutton to separate him from being yet another person to jump Martin.

It’s a mess that could’ve ended up a lot worse. Thankfully, Martin didn’t do anything too serious to Stetcher, who has been a joy to watch since training camp for Canucks fans and outsiders alike. Miller and Andersen both got early ends to their nights. Some skilled players on both sides got to look tough for a few seconds. Everybody got the crap out of their system and finished the game.

Well, most people. This is another case where I’m surprised there isn’t a fine involved. Milan Lucic was fined $5000 in 2014 for threatening to kill Dale Weise, though that was a bit more direct. Nazem Kadri received the same for making a throat-slitting gesture at Mark Giordano. The fact that Gudbranson said this on the way to the room probably helps him get away with it.

But it does mean that the league will have a watchful eye on him and the rest of his teammates on December 3rd. Who knows what happens then; the Canucks are already frustrated with themselves after going from winning four to losing eight, and if their current play holds, they might still be cratering to the bottom of the standings at that point. Combine that with just enough time to let tensions continue to boil but not enough time to let them fully dissipate, and who knows who gets targeted.

Kadri and Martin will be obvious ones, for the former’s unpunished hit and, well, the fact that Gudbranson wants to kill the latter man. But if one or both are unable to play for whatever reason, do they go after the kids instead? The Canucks will have home ice as well, with fans cheering on the blood lust.

As someone who grew up watching both teams, and someone who still watches both teams, and really enjoys seeing players not getting catastrophically injured as a result of unnecessary violence, I hope both sides stick to hockey during the grudge match at Rogers Arena. Or singalongs. Singalongs are dope too.