Flyers head coach Peter Laviolette called it a “man’s game” today. It was all that and a bit more with three high hits coming from the Philadelphia Flyers. Here’s video from Dafoomie showing Tom Sestito’s hit on Steven Kampfer, Tom Sestito blindside hit on Nathan Horton and Scott Hartnell’s near headshot on Chris Kelly.
Clearly the Flyers didn’t like the asskicking they got last month.
First Tostito Chip hit was on the higher side but seemed legal. Looks like he might’ve left his feet a la Ovechkin style.
Second Sestito hit was almost a mirror image of Matt Cooke’s hit on Marc Savard. Same area of the ice and everything. Scary stuff. Horton went after Sestito right away but wouldn’t play for the rest of the game. Doctors kept him out. A good precaution. After the game Julien said the following:
“There was a blindside hit on Horton. [The Washington game] is two days away, so we’ll see,” said Bruins head coach Claude Julien. “I haven’t had a chance to talk to our trainers or even get a doctor’s report to see how severe it is right now. I guess we’ll find out in the next few days here, but certainly [the doctors] didn’t allow him to come back in this game.”
Somehow Flyers got a powerplay and scored on it. Awful. Hopefully Horton’s fine. We won’t know more until tomorrow at the earliest.
Hartnell’s hit on Kelly was probably clean, though from a bad angle and near the head. It’s right at the whistle so we won’t call it late but it’s still near the head. One angle looks like shoulder to head, the other looks shoulder to shoulder. Not enough conclusive evidence for a suspension from this video. Hartnell will get a warning at best.
So that’s at least one potentially suspendable hit. They’d be suspendable if it was a Bruin. We’ll see if it’s the same for the Flyers. According to Haggs, Sestito has been suspended twice — a two gamer for a preseason game and then an AHL game. We assume AHL games don’t mean diddly to Shanny but that preseason game might. Gotta figure if Ference got three games for a hit that didn’t cause “an apparent injury” than Sesito has to be looking at four; factor in his prior offense and that’s what, five? Six? Who knows.
Big question is: Will Shanny — who’s been so quick to give the Bruins long suspensions — look at the Sestito-Horton and Hartnell-Kelly hits and deem them Shanabann worthy… or was he too busy watching the AFC Championship game?
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