SIMMONS: Panthers' Sam Bennett says he has nothing to apologize for
'That’s part of the game,' the Panthers pest said the morning after his collision with Leafs goalie Anthony Stolarz.
Article content
Sam Bennett doesn’t think he did anything wrong.
He never does.
tap here to see other videos from our team.
SIMMONS: Panthers' Sam Bennett says he has nothing to apologize for Back to video
He went to the net and tried to score. He did it in the manner in which he does just about everything in hockey: With extreme intensity that is forever bordering on rule-breaking.
“That’s part of the game,” Bennett said on the morning after his collision with Anthony Stolarz, his former Florida teammate and close friend, resulted in a hospital visit for Stolarz and a possible concussion for the Maple Leafs goaltender.
Bennett is upset that his friend got hurt — they exchanged texts overnight on Tuesday — but he won’t allow himself to be upset about how it happened or why it happened.
That’s how he makes his living in the National Hockey League. This is his calling card. He does what others won’t do or are unwilling to do, he pushes limits the way Darcy Tucker, a similar-sized forward, pushed limits years ago with the Maple Leafs.
To this day, Leafs fans still admire and adore Tucker’s approach to skirting that semi-visible unofficial line. And today, they so dislike the local kid, Bennett — the latest version of Public Enemy No. 1 — for playing a higher level of the Tucker game while wearing colours other than blue and white.
And that is forever the great contradiction of hockey and its fandom.
“I can understand why people react (to me) that way because Stolarz is injured,” Bennett said.
He watched the replay of the collision with Stolarz after the game. He said there was nothing intentional about the elbow that collided with Stolarz’s head. Until Stolarz went to the bench, almost midway through Game 1, and bent over and left his pre-game meal on the arena floor, did Bennett realize something had gone wrong.
“When your starting goalie gets injured, people are going to be upset,” Bennett said. “The contact was made. In my opinion it’s really just a bump. There was no forceful action. The last thing in my mind was to elbow him in the head. When it happened, I didn’t even realize I had made contact.”
Injuries have followed Bennett around playoff year after playoff year. Last year, he took out his now teammate, Brad Marchand, with what was thought to be a sucker punch.
The year before, in a series against the Leafs, Bennett drove then-rookie Matthew Knies into the boards, causing a concussion, ending Knies’ season.
This is part of the Bennett rap sheet. Coach Paul Maurice has long been of the belief that a playoff series is a something of a war of attrition. You don’t win games as much as you defeat your opponent, wear him down, wiping him out along the way.
“Yeah, he plays hard,” Maurice said of Bennett.
And then Maurice played up the noise in Toronto angle, the ‘everything gets overblown because it’s Toronto,’ angle, one of the favourite discussion points for all out-of-town coaches.
“There was a hit two and a half years ago that you guys have shown 4,000 times,” said the normally eloquent Maurice, changing his tone to sarcasm Tuesday morning. “There was a parking ticket seven years ago, that I think actually made the video.
“Listen, he’s got the puck, he’s on a power play, he goes to the net. He’s not through the paint … I understand. Like, call the fire department, pull your hair out and let’s move on, please.
“Now, (you) won’t let it go. And I knew you weren’t going to let this go.”
The collision came Monday night with the Leafs leading 4-1. The game ended with the hosts barely holding on for a 5-4 victory.
The game changed when Stolarz couldn’t continue. But now the question: Will the series change if Stolarz can’t play in Game 2 or beyond that?
Maurice, like just about everybody else on the Panthers, happens to be a Stolarz fan. How could you not be?
They loved having him as a teammate on the Stanley Cup squad and they loved getting to know him in his first and only season in Florida. Nobody wants to see their friends taken to hospital, but sometimes the game gets in the way of human feelings.
Leafs coach Craig Berube wanted a penalty called. He said it was an obvious one. Some in the Leafs organization wanted Bennett suspended.
In the end, the Leafs are the only ones penalized in any way by the uncertainty surrounding their starting goaltender.
“We’re six games into the playoffs and he took a puck outside the crease and now he’s a villain,” Maurice said of Bennett. “I expected that when I got up this morning, it still surprises me, fellas. There were far more egregious collisions in that game last night, but we won’t be talking about those, I would imagine, today.
“I know where this is going. I’ve seen every hit Sam Bennett has thrown since he was 12 years old on TV this morning. I get it. Go ahead, run with it.
“We’re good. The puck’s going to drop (Wednesday night).”
And Sam Bennett will be back at work, playing his game on the edge. It’s the only way he knows.
twitter.com/simmonssteve
Postmedia is committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion. Please keep comments relevant and respectful. Comments may take up to an hour to appear on the site. You will receive an email if there is a reply to your comment, an update to a thread you follow or if a user you follow comments. Visit our Community Guidelines for more information.