SOTW: Vincent Lecavalier Hates Missed Checks, Russians

Vincent Lecavalier is an angry man.

After the Tampa Bay Lightning fought back from a three-goal deficit Sunday afternoon to tie things midway through the third period of their game with the Penguins, Evgeni Malkin put the game on his shoulders and promptly planted a pair of slick backhanded goals on the hapless Bolts.

Lecavalier, the Tampa Bay captain, then missed on an attempted check of the Penguins’ leading scorer. Malkin dodged the hit by going low and squirming along the boards, a maneuver Penguins fans have seen Malkin perform once or twice (or a few dozen times) throughout his career.

Not until Lecavalier lost his mind has any player ever taken issue with the move.

I tend to think Lecavalier was frustrated not so much with Malkin avoiding the hit as

1) an old score the two have shared for years,

2) the fact that Malkin had just taken the Lightning’s improbable comeback and turned it into something we laugh about now, and

3) Malkin extending the last-place Lightning’s current losing streak to seven games.

Geno was given a two-minute roughing minor for the scrap. Jumping backwards into Lecavalier wasn’t as dirty as it was dumb—no one wins a fight with their shoulder blades.

Lecavalier earned two roughing minors and ten-minute misconduct. He didn’t speak to the media afterword, though coach Guy Boucher confirmed that Lecavalier thought Malkin went for his knees with the ducking maneuver.

That’s just stupid. If anyone should know how someone acts when they want to go for a player’s knees, it’s Lecavalier.

Resident NBCSN chuds Mike Milbury and Keith Jones suggested that Malkin’s move was similar to Brad Marchand’s turtling of Sami Salo, deeming Lecavalier’s public Chernobyl “the proper response” and providing more proof that everyone at fake Versus is still drunk.

Lecavalier got beat on the hit, his team got plastered on the scoreboard and he responded like any good captain should: by chasing a player around the circumference of the rink because he avoided your check and made you look like a fool.

Heinous.

Some final thoughts on the Malkin play…

Related posts:

1. SOTW: Swing and a Miss
2. SOTW: The Massive Irreperable Head Trauma that Keeps on Giving