Daniel Briere faces possible suspension after questionable cross-check
There has been a recurring trend in the National Hockey League this season, and it hasn’t been the scoring of highlight-reel goals.
During the first few weeks on the 2010-11 season, numerous players have received multi-game suspensions for questionable hits on opposing players or other prohibited actions. NHL disciplinarian
Colin Campbell has been kept busy staging phone calls with the offending players, and he is far from being finished.
The latest player to receive a conference call from Campbell is Philadelphia Flyers centre Daniel Briere. During a 6-1 rout of the visiting New York Islanders on Saturday, 30 October,
Briere cross-checked Islanders centre Frans Nielsen after a face-off with one minute left to play in the game.
Briere’s cross-check set off a chain reaction with other Islanders players, as goaltender Rick DiPietro chased after Briere as he skated past the Isles’ net. Flyers enforcer Daniel Carcillo
then attempted to defend his team-mate, while other players from both teams also got involved in the scuffle.
As a result of his actions, Briere received a five-minute major penalty for cross-checking, and was also sent off for a 10-minute game misconduct. Post-game, Briere said that he and his
Flyers team-mates were unhappy with how the Islanders were responding to the loss.
“When you get embarrassed like that, there’s lots of frustration," Briere said of the visitors’ reactions. “They didn’t like that and had to respond some way, somehow. They did it with
their fists.”
When all was said and done, a total of 120 minutes’ worth of penalties had been handed out to members of both teams. The Islanders accounted for more than half of that total, as they received
73 minutes in penalties.
Briere is scheduled to have a conference call with the league, where his fate will be determined. The Flyers’ next game will be against the Carolina Hurricanes on Monday, 1 November at
19:00.
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