Oilers’ Darnell Nurse Deep Fries Maple Leafs Enforcer Ryan Reaves For Dangerous Hit

In the second period of Saturday’s game between the Oilers and Leafs, Nurse was skating the puck out from behind the Oilers’ net when Reaves came barrelling into him, committing to a huge hit on an opponent who was in a vulnerable position with his head down.

Unfortunately, Reaves caught Nurse in the head and was given a match penalty as a bloody Nurse was helped off the ice.

It didn’t take long for the NHL’s Department of Player Safety to get involved as they announced a phone hearing for Reaves the following morning and later announced that he had been suspended for five games.

Thursday following Oilers practice, which Nurse was a participant in, he spoke to the media about the hit and did not mince words when it came to how he felt about it.
“There is some onus on the player with the puck to be aware of where everyone is on the ice. With that said, even if you put yourself in a bad spot there is a lot of body on a 6’4″ hockey player to hit and not one piece was touched other than my head.”
Nurse may have taken it a step too far, however, as he ended his comments on the play by calling Reaves a dirty player who purposely goes out to hurt other players.
“You can argue about the intent, but there’s certain guys in this league that go out there every shift and try to inflict pain, and I think it’s pretty obvious what was going on there.”

If Reaves was out to hurt Nurse, it’s doubtful that he would havepersonally apologized to him in the Oilers’ locker room after the hit.

While Reaves had been suspended three times in the past, as well as being fined twice, his last supplementary discipline was three years ago when he was suspended for an illegal check to the head of Filip Hronek.

Reports indicate that Nurse may be available to the Oilers this weekend, which may lead to some criticism from Leafs fans as Reaves will be ineligible to return for another four games.