Photo credit: Eric Bolte-USA TODAY Sports

Last night’s controversial play between Leafs’ Cédric Paré and Patrik Laine has taken the league by storm, including P.K. Subban who was not happy about the hit.

In the early stages of last night’s pre-season game between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Montreal Canadiens, Patrik Laine had a knee-on-knee collision with Cedric Pare as he attempted to cut into the offensive zone to create a rush chance.

The unfortunate result of the hit was Laine being forced out of the game, and shortly after the collision, Canadiens’ defenseman Arber Xhekaj came to his defense as he jumped Pare before landing several shots. Xhekaj was given a game misconduct and a grand total of 27 PIMs and was then fined earlier today for his actions.

Of course, social media exploded, and with it came both fan bases giving their two cents on the play, as well as some of hockey’s more venerable personalities like P.K. Subban. The former Canadiens’ defenseman took to Twitter to give his full insight on what happened from his point of view and urged the NHL to do a better job at protecting their superstars.
“What the hell was that last night, on the penalty kill, stepping up trying to make a hit you stick your knee out on a superstar? Irresponsible. I don’t like it. This wasn’t a battle in the corner, this is open-ice, penalty kill, pre-season, folks.

Patrik Laine deserves a lot more respect than the way he was treated last night and that should have never happened. Where is the respect for Patrik Laine? Where is the respect for NHL superstars playing in the National Hockey League? I don’t see it.

I’m not talking about babying superstars, you saw Pastrnak, you saw Tkachuk going at it in the playoffs. These guys are tough. But we gotta respect them. There can’t be any cheap shots on our superstars. I’m sorry, but not by a guy that people aren’t [there to see]. Cedric Pare, I didn’t go to the game last night to go watch him play. I’m paying admission to watch Patrik Laine play, not him.”

He then defended the actions of Xhekaj, asking what was the defenseman supposed to do after seeing Laine go down? Due to today’s game having changed dramatically over the years, he believes it’s impossible to jump players but that he still did the honourable thing and defended his star teammate:
“Cedric, you gotta fight. You can’t walk away. Poor Arber Xhekaj doesn’t know what to do. What’s he gonna do? You can’t jump guys in today’s NHL. Guys are looking around because there’s nothing you can do. There’s cameras everywhere. So how do we police this? It’s a problem.

People are paying big money to watch superstars play. Team sport, people pay money to watch the stars play. So we gotta keep them on the ice. There’s gotta be respect in a pre-season game… Last night did not look good and it should have never happened. It was disgusting.”
 

Pare walked away without any supplemental discipline, but the rivalry between these two clubs has certainly grown after last night’s play. Pare will more than likely be starting the year in the AHL, but when the Leafs and Habs meet in the regular season, it’s going to be fireworks.