Tyler Myers on his hit on Trevor Lewis: ‘If I’m three or five inches shorter I don’t think we’re even talking about it’

Tyler Myers avoided supplemental discipline for a hit on Trevor Lewis that caused Myers to get a five-minute major and a match penalty after the officials took a closer look at it on Saturday night.

The Vancouver Canucks defenceman spoke with media yesterday about the hit and shared his perspective.

For context, here’s the hit in question:

Lewis gets a glove in Myers’ face and the Canuck defenceman clearly has ideas of finishing Lewis into the boards with a hard check. He does so, and Lewis’ head makes contact with the glass, but as Myers — and presumably the NHL’s Department of Player Safety will tell you — the principal point of contact is the shoulder, making this a “clean” hit under the current rules.

“When I saw after I went back into the room, I was pretty confident that I wasn’t going to get anything,” said Myers when asked if he thought he might face supplemental discipline in the immediate aftermath of the hit. “It’s happened to me before throughout my career, it wasn’t targeting his head or anything, it’s just a product of me being too big. I think if I’m three, four or five inches smaller I don’t think we’re even talking about it.”

“I understand there was contact to the head, but the first contact comes at the back of his shoulder and it’s a product of me being a bit of a giant.”

Despite this not being the first time Myers’ size has worked against him in this fashion, the towering Canucks rearguard knows he can’t let thoughts of letting up creep into his head, especially given how well he’s performed this season.

“I definitely can’t change the way I play,” added Myers. “This stuff comes up because of my size. It is something I do have to watch out for because I don’t want to be sitting out a game, and Saturday I missed the whole game. I have to be aware of it (body position). I was going into that shift trying to get physical because we were having a pretty bad start to the game.”

Lewis remained in the game after the hit, and appeared to be no worse for wear after remaining down on the ice when the hit first took place.