The NHL has fined Buffalo head coach Lindy Ruff $10,000 for his involvement in this past Thursday nights brawl for putting Andrew Peters and Adam Mair on the ice after a legal hit by Senators forward Chris Neil. There were no suspensions handed out so one has to wonder now if the Senators will seek retribution on Peters tonight for breaking the code and going after goalie Ray Emery.
Lets face it, even Lindy Ruff said Peters went too far in going after Emery on Thursday night.
The best video I have seen of the Neil hit was compliments of TSN last night. Darren Dreger and Gino Redo of TSN showed the play in slow motion with the clock ticking in the top left corner showing the time with hundredths of a second on it. After Chris Drury released the puck, it was only .49 hundredths of a second after Drury had no puck at his feet that Neil hit him. That is less than half a second. So you tell me how any NHL player can stop his action of hitting someone in the blink of an eye because that is what less than half a second amounts to?
Former Sabres defensemen Gary Galley said it best yesterday on Team 1200 in Ottawa during his afternoon show with John Rodenburg and I paraphase a bit as this is almost word for word. "From all the players around the league I have talked to today, they all said they lost a ton of respect for Peters, for going after Emery. On top of it all Peters doesn't even take off his helmet while Emery has no head gear on, what a joke."
Well said Gary, you hit the nail on the head! By the way, Gary does a great job on both CBC and Rogers Sportsnet in Canada covering the NHL.
The problem is, the NHL will have Colin Campbell present at the game tonight and you know the rest of the NHL executives will be watching closely as the league does not want to lead off every sports show for the wrong reasons.
So many times, the build up of a rematch with this magnitude ends up being nothing more than silence all night. Time will tell.
Now onto the game. The Senators lead the season series with the Sabres winning four of seven. Tonight will be the final time these teams meet but a playoff rematch from last year looms large as both teams could face off in the second round.
Brian Magratton will be inserted into the line-up tonight, who ends up being a healthy scratch will be interesting. It will most likely be either Christoph Schubert or Patrick Eaves.
Ray Emery gets the start in goal tonight. Let the games begin!
NOTE - Congratulations to the Binghamton Senators who are now the hosts of the 2008 AHL All-Star game. The announcement was made last night at Broome County Veterans Memorial Arena in Binghamton.
Kevin
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