In Thursday’s edition of Daily face-to-face live, hosts Tyler Yaremchuk and Mike McKenna discussed the goalie-centric scrimmage between the St. Louis Blues and Minnesota Wild on Wednesday night. Former NHL goaltender McKenna ended all the action as Jordan Binnington once again found himself at the center of controversy.
Mike McKenna: We had fireworks on the ice last night, didn’t we, Tyler?
Tyler Yaremchuk: Yeah. We have a goalie here in Mike McKenna and we had goalie fireworks last night. Let’s talk about Jordan Binnington vs. Marc-André Fleury: the fight that never happened. Jordan Binnington gives up a goal, Ryan Hartman runs into him, and then all hell breaks loose thanks to Binnington.
He goes after Hartman and throws a blocker, which he will have a hearing with Player Safety today. Marc-André Fleury is indignant and goes down, but the linesmen do not want them to get in there and separate them. Jordan Binnington continues to ignite the crowd for some reason. Mike, walk us through that game and what you’ve seen from Binnington as a goalie.
Mike McKenna: I think Binnington is just frustrated, man. The Blues lead 3-1 five minutes into the second period and two minutes later they are down 4-3. Hartman is 5-3 with 4 goals in five minutes, and I think Binnington was just crazy, man. It’s been a long season and we’ve seen that before. When Hartman cut him, his threads crossed. He’s going to be suspended, I think. The league doesn’t like thrown blockers; you’re basically using a weapon in their eyes. He will have a game or two for that.
Marc-Andre Fleury just spoke this week about not wanting to fight because it’s not the time of year and he broke a knuckle in June. Well, here he is tearing up the ice because Binner is going crazy on the other end. And it was Ric Flair night in St. Louis! It was the perfect time for all of this. Minnesota ends up winning 8-5 and Binnington gets thrown out. Henrik Lundqvist said on TNT after he would hide under a rock after allowing 5 goals and wouldn’t fire up the crowd like Binner. It was just a wild affair, sort of classic Binnington. I think Fleury had just seen enough and said « it’s time to go ». The linesmen didn’t let him; that’s how you keep hockey from being big, isn’t it?
Tyler Yaremchuk: It would have been something if Jordan Binnington had finally fought. Both keepers received minors for leaving the crease and Binnington also received a match penalty for Hartman’s blocker which started it all. We’ll hear more from the Player Safety Department at some point today.
You can watch the full episode here…
