NHL head disciplinarian Brendan Shanahan joined Dennis and Callahan Tuesday morning, discussing all things NHL and the job he has done in his first season on the job. Shanahan took over for Colin Campbell (father of Bruins forward Gregory Campbell) on June 1.
Penguins forward Evgeni Malkin was not suspended or fined for his hit from behind on Bruins defenseman Johnny Boychuk Sunday. Shanahan explained the ruling on the hit, which was called boarding on ice.
“Boychuk’s shoulder is exposed, so it’s a green light, good time to hit, and just as the contact is about to be made Boychuk reverses the puck and turns his back,” he said. “It’s the same with [David] Krejci and Mark Stuart back in December. It was the same a while back when Zach Bogasian of Winnipeg hit Pierre Marc Bouchard of Minnesota, broke his nose and unfortunately there was a concussion, but we felt this was something we have to be consistent on.”
Bruins forward Brad Marchand has been punished multiple times by Shanahan this season, as he was fined $2,500 for his Dec. 5 slew foot on Penguins defenseman Matt Niskanen and suspended five-games for his low bridge hit on Canucks blueliner Sami Salo on Jan. 5. Shanahan, who had talked to Marchand over the offseason at Marchand’s request over what he could and couldn’t do, said he had a “forceful” talk with him following his clip on Habs defenseman Alexei Emelin on Feb. 15.
“We had a conversation with Peter Chiarelli on the phone after the low hit on Emelin, which I didn’t think was as low as Salo. I didn’t think deserved a suspension,” he said. “There was just stuff about that hit that just sort of stunk. It wasn’t smart to be tempting fate almost as low. There was 1.6 seconds left in the period, it was in the offensive zone.
“It’s not illegal to hit a guy with 1.6 seconds left. It’s not. You can hit a guy whenever you want. But there were things about that hit ‘¦ it was low again. It seemed from his remarks after the first suspension that he sort of didn’t get it. So we had a really good forceful conversation that didn’t result in a fine or a suspension, but I hope we got to him.”
As for the Bruins in general, Shanahan responded to the idea that he has a bias against the B’s when it comes to suspensions. Marchand, Milan Lucic and Andrew Ference have all been suspended this season for various infractions.
“It’s funny, people in Boston might think I have something against the Bruins, which is so absurd and crazy,” he said. “It makes you feel any better I can promise you all I have to do is flip on my Twitter page, or if I ever wanted to venture onto the internet, almost every team in the league thinks there a specific reason I hate their market and hate their city as well.
“I have to defend why I don’t hate Pittsburgh, or why I don’t hate Montreal, or why I don’t hate Buffalo, or why I don’t hate Minnesota. For Boston, it’s even more absurd, quite honestly. Talk about a team I grew up admiring. Cam Neely is probably the one player I tried to model my game after more than anybody. It doesn’t matter if it’s a team you grew up admiring, or a team you played for, there’s so much scrutiny in this job, you can do this job and you can’t sleep at night, if you don’t do it with as much integrity as possible. That doesn’t mean you’re perfect. You would love to have a perfect season in sports. You can objectively look at this hit and disagree with the assessment, and that’s fair. That’s always going to be fair. But it’s absurd to suggest in any market that we have a grudge or have it in against anybody.”
