Saturday afternoon's game between the Boston Bruins and the Vancouver Canucks was arguably the most entertaining game of the season so far, with intense emotion, fights, line brawls and great goals. Unfortunately, and as we should have expected, the game also turned ugly at times.
One such instance was when Brad Marchand of the Bruins went a bit too low with a hit on Vancouver's Sami Salo, who left the game with a concussion after he was sent pot over teakettle with the hit. Marchand was given a five-minute major for clipping and a game misconduct, and it wasn't the first time he's handed out a similar hit against the Canucks.
Just like that hit on Sedin, Marchand is claiming it was all in the name of self defense. No, seriously.
First, the video of the hit:
Said Marchand, talking about why he went low on Salo:
"The puck was going around the boards and I went to pick it up and was kinda looking over my shoulder and saw Salo coming in and I just kind of went down. You look up and you see a guy who's 6-foot-4/6-foot-5 coming in on you, and your instincts are to just protect yourself and it was very unfortunate he was hurt on the play."
This is similar to his reasoning for the low hit on Sedin, although the circumstances are a bit different. It was obvious that Sedin was coming in for a big check, why it's debatable that Salo was even gearing up for a big hit at all. Marchand tries to make it sound as though Salo was coming at him high; the video doesn't exactly tell the same story.
Marchand faces a phone hearing with the NHL today and it's likely he's looking at something close to a four game suspension.
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