Just when things couldn't get worse for the Toronto Maple Leafs, they did on Tuesday night. Facing off against the Boston Bruins, Leafs captain Auston Matthews left after taking a hit from behind from defenseman Nikita Zadorov. Matthews hit the boards head first. He would go after Zadorov and hit him, but left due to a lower body injury. Zadorov didn't get penalized for the hit.
Zadorov caught the ire of Max Domi, who tried to fight him after the hit. Then, Leafs head coach Craig Berube blasted the officiating, saying that the hit should have been a penalty. Overall, Toronto was furious about Zadorov hitting their superstar in the manner he did.
After the game, Zadorov commented on the hit that ultimately injured Matthews, and claimed that he had no malice intentions. Zadorov said it was "a normal play."
Leafs fans won't like Nikita Zadorov's comments about hit that injured Auston Matthews
“I didn’t really hit him," said Zadorov, via The Athletic's Fluto Shinza. "I hit with my right shoulder. Ninety-nine percent of my hits in the NHL are with my right shoulder. So I thought he was going to come up. I’m not sure on what hit he got hurt either. Like when he went after me again, I kind of hit him. Or maybe when I played the puck, I hit him with the puck. We don’t know. I’m not going to speculate on that. It was just routine.
“I didn’t really want to hit him. I wanted to provide him to take the middle. I just stood there. You can see on the video that I hit him with my chest. There really wasn’t any intention to hurt him or anything like this. Just play hard against the top players on the other team. That’s my job.”
No matter what Zadorov was going to say, Leafs fans weren't going to like it. But they certainly won't like the Bruins defenseman saying that hitting Matthews in the back forcing him head first into the boards was "a normal play."
Domi tried fighting Zadorov after the hit, but the Bruin wouldn't engage, as he said he didn't want to fight the Leaf since they are friends. That decision paid off for Boston, as they received the powerplay, and David Pastrnak scored his second goal of the game.
For Matthews, there is uncertainty how much time he could miss due to his lower body injury. There is expected to be an update on Wednesday, as Berube didn't have an immediate update after the game. If Matthews is to miss significant time, a bad start to the Leafs' season just got worse.
It's currently unknown if Zadorov could face discipline from the NHL's Department of Player Safety.
If Mattthews does miss any amount of time, the next meeting between the two teams on March 24 could get ugly.