Anaheim Ducks forward Jean-Francois Jacques faces suspension due to illegal interference -NHL Update
The National Hockey League (NHL) handed down another suspension as a part of their campaign to minimise illegal hits and to come down hard on players who break the rules, as NHL senior vice president of player safety and operation, Brendan Shanahan, announced
the suspension of Anaheim Ducks forward, Jean-Francois Jacques, on Tuesday, September 27.
Jean-Francois Jacques, a 26-year-old left winger for Anaheim Ducks, is now banned from playing with his team for the remainder of the preseason along with five regular season matchups.
The player was awarded with the suspension due to his illegal interference in the game from the benches and starting a fight with Vancouver Canucks forward, Mike Duco, during their preseason matchup on September 24.
"As the video shows, Jacques comes on the ice on a legal line change, but he skates the entire width of the ice surface, taking a direct path to his opponent with the sole purpose of starting a fight", Shanahan said in a video released by the league announcing
his decision.
Jacques’ suspension comes just a day after Shanahan banned Columbus Blue Jackets player, James Wisniewski and Minnesota Wild forward, Brad Staubitz, for 11 and 6 games respectively.
According to the video which also showed a clip of the incident that caused Jacques’ suspension, he actually did leave the benches as the game was in progress and proceeded straight to Duco, starting a fight.
Anaheim Ducks head coach, Randy Carlyle, finds something like that very hard to defend.
"He didn't really have a reason", Carlyle said of the fight. "He didn't know why he did it. He just said I did it and I shouldn't have done it. All I told him, 'You just tell the truth.' That's all you can do. … There's no masking what happened. I'm sure
he's not proud of it and we're not proud of it as an organization and a coaching staff".
Along with the hefty suspension, Jacques will also have to forfeit $17,567.55 in salary, which will go to the players’ emergency assistance fund.
Jean-Francois Jacques will be allowed to return on October 21, for Anaheim’s matchup against Dallas Stars.
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