“No fooling around on this one folks.”
Matt Niskanen’s cross-check on Sidney Crosby has been a hotly-debated topic since the incident occurred in the first period of Game 3 on Monday, and it didn’t take long for Don Cherry to voice his opinion on the matter.
“I am really upset over this,” Cherry said during Tuesday’s Coach’s Corner segment before breaking down the play.
“[Alex Ovechkin] hits him in the head, that’s why [Crosby] falls down. Now watch the guy [Niskanen] coming across, cross-checks him looking right at him. Are you kidding me? Hockey play, anybody that says this is a hockey play is out of their mind. This guy meant to do it, in my opinion,” Cherry said, also noting the long and chippy history between Crosby and Niskanen. “He meant to do it, he knew what he was doing, there was bad feelings, and it goes on and on and on.”
The Penguins announced earlier on Tuesday that Crosby has been diagnosed with a concussion—the fourth of his NHL career.
Niskanen was issued a five-minute major penalty and a game misconduct. As reported early on Tuesday, Niskanen will not be receiving any supplemental discipline. Ovechkin was not penalized.
“You don’t like to say it was planned—it wasn’t planned at all. But the opportunity was there,” Cherry said. “Absolutely ridiculous this guy doesn’t get four or five games. And that’s the way I feel about that.”
“He just shouldn’t have cross-checked him in the head,” Cherry went on to explain. “And the key was, he didn’t look down at him. He’s looking straight ahead. He knew he got him good. In my opinion, cheap shot.”
Cherry compared the Niskanen-Crosby incident with Connor McDavid’s injury last season, when a shove from Philadelphia Flyers defenceman Brandon Manning sent McDavid barrelling into the boards just 13 games into his rookie campaign.
The play, which resulted in McDavid being sidelined three months with a fractured clavicle, was called “a hockey play gone wrong” by many—but not Cherry.
“Remember last year, I said McDavid got hurt, remember that I said that, and everybody told me I was wrong. It was a hockey play. I said ‘they meant to hurt him’ and we found out later, when they played the next year, the guy that hit him confirmed—well, McDavid is the guy that said it, he confirmed that [Manning] said it,” said Cherry. “I know what I’m talking about.”
Here’s the quote Cherry is referring to, from the Oilers-Flyers meeting last December:
“He wanted to say some comments today about what went on last year and I thought it was one of the most classless things I’ve ever seen on the ice,” McDavid said of Manning following an Oilers-Flyers matchup in December. “He said some things and our guys responded accordingly. And I guess we can put the whole if he did it on purpose thing to rest because what he said out there kinda confirmed that. Shows what kind of guy he is when he doesn’t step up and fight some of our guys.”
The issue, explained Cherry, comes back to the NHL’s instigator rule, which brings an automatic penalty to anyone who starts a fight.
“You cannot protect the stars anymore because of the instigator rule,” Cherry explained. “That was a cheap shot, in my opinion, and he should’ve gotten at least four games.”
As of Tuesday evening, the team has said Crosby will be out for Game 4 on Wednesday, but haven’t specified a timeline beyond that.
“Best hockey player in the world right now and he’s out right now,” Cherry said. “It’s a shame.”
