Really Al??? From the NHL explanation, “Thursday night in NY, Montreal forward Brandon Prust delivered a late and violent hit to Rangers forward Derek Stepan causing an injury. After chipping the puck up the boards and past Montreal forward Thomas Vanek, Stepan veers to his right to join the rush. “ “Approaching laterally from the middle of the ice Prust drives his left shoulder up into Stepan’s chest and jaw well after Stepan releases the puck and well after the time for where he is able to be checked. This is interference. What elevates this hit to merit supplemental discipline is it’s extreme lateness and the amount of head contact that results from the way it was delivered. After releasing the puck Stepan both changes direction and takes two strides to elude Vanek. Nearly a full second elapses between when he releases the puck and the moment of impact. That is well past the point for when a player should have to remain on guard for an opponent finishing a check.” “In fact, Prust doesn’t even commit to this hit until after Stepan has released the puck. Prust is in complete control of the play since Stepan does not see him coming and can’t expect to be hit this late, the onus is on Prust to avoid contact completely.”
So Prust is FLAT OUT full of sh*t. Chest AND JAW. Lateness AND THE AMOUNT OF HEAD CONTACT. So Prust is full of it. It wasn't just because it was late as he claims. It was about JAW AND HEAD CONTACT as well, and it says so right in the NHL release. Look, there is no defending it. Is it the worst hit, or even close to the worst hit, I have ever seen...NO, but it was late, cheap, dirty, and caught his head/jaw as well...period. And I do believe there was intent there after the Price play. Not that Prust said I want to hurt a Ranger, but he had zero issue trying to make a statement, rules be damned. For Prust and Terrien to take this stance is comical. And for Therrien to compare this AT ALL to the Price play is a disgrace, and if the NHL had ANY balls he would be fined. That kind of stuff is why the NHL gets a bad rep.
What a joke and a liar Prust is: The NHL deems a hit late around .6 seconds, and I’m at .8 seconds, so you know, that’s on me. It’s late, but for me my focus was on trying to make a good, clean body check and not leave my feet, my elbows tucked, and everything about the actual contact is clean, it’s just late.
Best part of this is the flat out lack of respect the Habs are showing. Essentially saying the Rangers are lying about Stepan's injury (I guess surgery was a lie also). Comparing a clean hit by Kreider to a clear dirty and cheap hit by Prust (which again makes me feel that they were out for payback the minute Price was ruled out for the series). Prust saying clean hit, just late (meanwhile the NHL release says flat out jaw and head contact). It's a flat out disgrace. Yes we are biased in here, but to me this is all one-sided if you take the NHL's word for it that the Kreider play was clean, and just unfortunate. I don't like what the Habs have turned this into. Best response...WIN the series, and WIN big tonight in a wave of emotion effort.
Everyone is going to be biased when it comes to their team. I would expect nothing different so that doesn't bother me so much. When it comes to Montreal though they have bothered a lot of their league with their bullshit. Not that they're saints but now you understand why the Bruins and their fans can't stand them. Like I said previously also Montreal acts like it's them and the rest of the NHL. They walk around with their noses up in the air as if the sport would no longer exist without them. Perhaps that was true decades ago but that's no where near the case today.
I agree Mess. Montreal is not near the top of the list in terms of NHL franchises these days. Newsflash...while hockey is Canada's game, it is driven by US franchises for sure. That is why we have 7 Canadian teams left. The league cannot exist based on Canadian teams only, or mainly. When was the last time a Canadian team won the cup? Yet here are the Habs acting as if they are gods gift. It is a joke. And their "act" around the Price injury, the way they responded to that, Prust's BS, Therrien's comments comparing a legal hit to an illegal hit, and now doubting that Stepan is even hurt is a disgrace IMO. Again, I guess it was a fake surgery huh? It started early when Therrien went from clean hit what can you do last Saturday. To clean but he didn't make an effort to avoid Price last Sunday. To clearly it was reckless and anyone can see that last Monday (anyone except him on Saturday and Sunday I guess). Those comments right there tell us ALL everything we need to know about Therrien and the Habs. We need to beat these POS Canadiens. Flat out joke what they have turned this into. HUGE coincidence that the guy who cried the most about Price, Prust, is the guy with the illegal hit that got him suspended...shocker.
For sure Mess, and I'll tell you something else, if we don't win tonight I am going to be pissed. And if we don't win tonight quite frankly we don't deserve to win this series anyway. There is just no way we should lose two home games to a team without their best player. A team that is starting a rookie goalie with 0 playoff starts prior to game 2...NO REASON AT ALL. It is that simple to me. We have no excuse not to win this game tonight and take full control of this series at 3-1. And if we cannot get this done, then we'd have no shot to win the cup anyway, and we don't deserve to beat Montreal.
Tonight is not an everything or nothing game imo. This team has shown it can win on the road. It has shown it can come back from anything. Hell im confident that if needed this team can win all 4 road games this series. Wont need it because tonight they will roll over the les habitants(sp). 4-1 and that 1 will come from a 6 on 4 with 31 seconds to go. Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk
Tonight might be the biggest game in the series but 2:2 going back to Montreal, it wont be the end of the world. We all know they play better on the road anyway. I have more confidence in them winning in Montreal than tonight, to be honest.
IF it is 2-2 after tonight, and I do not in any way shape or form expect that, I agree that it doesn't mean the end of the world for us tied at 2. BUT if I were a betting man I would put my money on the team winning tonight to win this series. That's how I view this. The winner tonight becomes the clear strong fav in this series. And I would be betting on that team to win this series. From our POV, there is simply no excuse to lose both games at home AGAIN against this team with their best player out...NONE. And that is just being honest people. This is where Hank, and McDonagh, and MSL (missed about 5 golden chances last game), and Nash, and so on earn their money. Games like tonight in a rocking MSG. No excuse not to win this game IMO.
Melrose just said the same sort of things about Therrien. Ridiculous and playing games. I will be so happy if/when we knock them out. They turned out to be a whiny classless bunch of bit*hes from Therrien on down. Amazingly worse than the Pens.
