A night with just fives games on the docket has produced two ejections on questionable hits.
The first -- a Tom Wilson special -- has already been well documented.
The second came during one of the night’s late games between the Colorado Avalanche and the St. Louis Blues.
Alex Steen leveled Nathan MacKinnon at the Avs blue line, grabbed the puck and took it in for a scoring chance. After he got the shot off, Erik Johnson came over and appeared to drive his elbow into Steen’s face.
Let’s roll the tape:
Steen’s hit was a clean, solid shot that separated MacKinnon from the puck.
Johnson’s certainly looked the exact opposite. He was penalized for elbowing on the play plus the game misconduct.
Steen, meanwhile, was forced out the game. The Blues announced he would miss the rest of the game with an upper-body injury,
The ensuing scrum spilled over after Johnson was heading to the box. Alex Pietrangelo came and got in Johnson’s face, prompting Gabriel Landeskog to shove Pietrangelo, which didn’t sit well for Joel Edmundson, who tried to get at Landeskog.
Johnson was handed a two-game suspension last December for shoving Vladislav Namestnikov into the boards after giving him a vicious two-handed slash.
The NHL’s Department of Player Safety was going to be busy on Saturday due to the Wilson situation. Now, they’ve got more work to do.
Scott Billeck is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @scottbilleck