The Department of Player Safety issued their only punishment from Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Finals, fining Edmonton Oilers’ forward Sam Carrick a total of $2,213.54, the maximum allowable, for slashing Florida Panthers’ defenseman Dmitry Kulikov. Elliotte Friedman of TSN followed up the report by announcing the league would not pass down any additional discipline.
The play in question occurred near the end of Game 2 after Kulikov delivered a hard hit to Carrick. Afterward, Carrick slashed Kulikov in what is best described as his ’nether region’, resulting in a two-minute minor penalty for slashing, and a 10-minute game misconduct. Since Carrick was ejected from the game, teammate Evander Kane served his two-minute penalty.
Expectedly, the Department of Player Safety will expand its leniency throughout the Stanley Cup playoffs. Still, it is surprising that this will be the only supplemental discipline from Game 2. Aside from Carrick, defenseman Vincent Desharnais and forward Warren Foegele were ejected from the Oilers bench, with forward Leon Draisaitl delivering a controversial hit to Aleksander Barkov.
Nevertheless, the Oilers organization should view the lack of punishment as a silver lining to their Game 2 loss, as they will not be forced to lose any players for a pivotal Game 3. Managing only one goal through the first six periods of the Stanley Cup Final, Edmonton will need all hands on deck to get back into this series.
Elbow a guy in the face (intentional or not), and cause him to he out for the rest of the game if not more, he only has to serve 2 minutes and that’s that? Department of Player safety is a joke. Let’s actually punish players who go out and try to injure the other team. Even fining them a a couple bucks isn’t going to do much either. Suspend them a game and let’s see if they do it again when they’re down three games in the series.
100%!
Drai was a foot in the air before contact. Ridiculous, weak take from DPS.
If the NHL needed a clip for their player safety video showing the epitome of a leaving the feet check to the head, Draisital obliged.
Draisaitl and Foegle probably should be sitting game 3, the DoPS is a joke
Yes Bennett should have been suspended for Marchard . As Draisital should be. Draisanitl stop talking to media everytime he opens his mouth he becomes less likable. I did not care Who won but now hope Florida wins just Draisanitl loses . Will he then give other teams credit not say they are lucky.
anyone who clocks Marchand deserves a medal
2 minutes for nutting
Caddyshack – Rodney Dangerfield. Fore! I shoulda yelled two”
Frankly, this is embarrassing as a fan of the game and to the league itself. Players have been suspended for multiple games for what Draisaitl did and yet nothing happens here because the league doesn’t want to suspend a star player during the Cup finals. Absolute clown show.
I just hope Barkov is okay and ready to play Thursday night….and in a foul mood!
Should be interesting to see if a Panthers player targets the head of McDavid now. If it’s only a 2 minute penalty, why wouldn’t they try to knock out their star player for the series?
McSatan needs his clock cleaned!
Logically, the league has basically encouraged just that type of retaliation.
It seems that way. Although “logically” is perhaps the key word there. The DOPS often throws logic out the window so if a Panthers player retaliates maybe they’d get the book thrown at them. It’s hard to know what to expect.
Oh, no doubt whoever would hit McDavid with an elbow would be suspended indefinately. The Panthers know this, so unless they have a big lead in the Cup clinching game, they really can’t do anything about it right now.