In the dying seconds of the Vancouver Canucks game against the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday night, there was a late altercation involving Conor Garland and Connor McDavid. The end result of the altercation was McDavid cross-checking Garland in the head.
However, behind the play, Canucks defenceman Tyler Myers performed the same act on Oilers defenceman Evan Bouchard.
Both players received match penalties with under five seconds remaining in the contest, which earned them both a hearing with the National Hockey League’s Department of Player’s Safety (DOPS).
Those meetings took place on Monday. Myers met with the media afterward to discuss how his hearing went.
Myers explained that the call with the DOPS was short and that they would find out their decision later today.
“Not a lot,” Myers jokingly laughed with the crowd when asked what he was thinking. “Things were getting heated there at the end. I’m not ignorant to the fact of how it looks in real time. But if you slow it down, I did start lower and as he started to bring his hands up, it kind of redirected my stick a little higher.
“I know how it looks. I never intended to hit him in the face. I’ve never cross-checked anybody in the face in my whole career. I mean, I was talking to him at the red line after. [I] Assumed he’d be okay. I don’t want to hit a guy in the face like that. It was unfortunate that it ended up that way. Glad he’s okay.”
“It’s probably a little aggressive,” Myers continued. “But it was at the end of a good hockey game. There’s other stuff going on, too. It was a good battle at the end. Like I said, I don’t want to get my stick up that high. It’s good everyone is fine.”
Myers reiterated his stance on what happened and what he said during his call with the DOPS:
“I know how it looks, especially in real-time. But for me, what I talked about was my intent. I didn’t intend to hit him in the face. I have a video; when you slow it down, it starts lower, and my stick gets redirected. I know it happens fast; I know the way it looks, but it’s just explaining that wasn’t my intention, and we’ll see what happens.”
Here’s a closer look on the slowed down video Myers is talking about.
We will wait to hear a decision from the Department of Player’s Safety to see if Myers will be suspended and, if so, for how many games.