On Thursday, after his Calgary Flames defeated the Colorado Avalanche 6-5, Sam Bennett was seen in his dressing room wearing the Calgary Police Service hat as the Flames’ MVP.
He did this despite recording just two shots on goal and finishing with zero points, despite the offensive fireworks his team provided.
So how could he be a player of the game without making much of an offensive impact? As Don Cherry explained on Coach’s Corner Saturday, it’s because he stood up for his teammate.
Late in the second period of that game Thursday, Bennett fought with Ian Cole of the Avalanche after he delivered a bone-crunching hit on Mark Jankowski that Bennett took exception to.
As Cherry proved with some video evidence during the segment, it got his teammates fired up to respond.
“I really think what [Bennett] does, stepping up for a teammate, getting in there, it’s never easy when you have to go and stand in there and he did it like a champ, and I think that’s probably what brought our group together,” Travis Hamonic said after the game.
“I thought the turning point probably was [Bennett] stepping up for a teammate there late in the second,” added Flames coach Bill Peters.
As he has always done, Cherry stuck up for fighting’s place in the game – “that’s not vigilante, that’s sticking up for your teammate.”
Bennett would agree with the former coach’s sentiment.
“I didn’t like the hit, but it’s part of the game and sometimes when there’s hits like that you have to do your own policing and sometimes it’s necessary,” Bennett said of his fight with Cole.
It helped Calgary earn a win, so maybe there is something to dropping the gloves remaining in the NHL, after all.
The debate rages on.
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