Tuesday’s Dallas Stars - New York Rangers almost seemed destined to be a wild affair, and so far, the two teams aren’t disappointing.
For one thing, Chris Kreider and the Rangers were open about “not forgetting” Cody Eakin’s hit on Henrik Lundqvist, something Eakin realized heading in. The Stars had their own irritations coming into this game, as they clearly weren’t happy with their loss to the Buffalo Sabres and their shaky play overall.
So, yeah, plenty of reason for this to be a rowdy affair.
Kreider is delivering in particular, with the most memorable moment being his strange fight with Eakin, which you can see above. SBNation’s Pat Iversen points out that Kreider probably should have been ejected for hitting Eakin with a piece of his equipment, a violation of Rule 53.
As many know, Kreider has even more of a reputation for “interacting” with goalies, as he did once again with Antti Niemi:
oh Kreider pic.twitter.com/7B6M3352ex
— steph (@myregularface) January 18, 2017
The Stars currently lead the game 5-3, so it’s been a busy one on the scoreboard, too.
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Both Eakin and Kreider ended up scoring key goals in the Stars’ eventual 7-6 win. Read more about the game as a whole here.