Leafs’ lack of response to Gudas hit disappointing, but not surprising
A nightmarish season for the Toronto Maple Leafs took a turn for the worse during Thursday night’s win over the Anaheim Ducks, when Radko Gudas knocked captain Auston Matthews out of the game with a knee-on-knee hit.
Matthews left the game and will be evaluated further before a timeline for his return to the ice is established, and Gudas is set for a phone hearing with the league’s Department of Player Safety that could result in a fine or suspension of up to five games.
But something beyond Matthews’ status and a lost year for the Leafs that remains troubling was the team’s lack of physical response to a seemingly dirty hit on its captain.
Defenseman Morgan Rielly acknowledged the bad optics of the situation by taking “full responsibility” for not responding in his postgame remarks, but that does not absolve the other members of the team who were on the ice.
Morgan Rielly says he takes “full responsibility” for not responding in the moment after Gudas hit Matthews and that he didn’t realize how bad the hit was at first.
On Friday’s episode of Daily Faceoff LIVE, host Tyler Yaremchuk and co-host and former NHL defenseman Colby Cohen discussed
Tyler Yaremchuk: The other big headline from yesterday’s games came out of Toronto, where Radko Gudas was at it again. A knee on Auston Matthews… Colby, I know you’re like a dog on a leash. You want to rant about the Leafs and their lack of response… Craig Berube comes out and again kind of does the whole, “I don’t know, it’s in the room, I don’t understand why no one went after him.” It’s been two years now of Craig Berube sitting in front of the media and basically going like, “I don’t know why the guys in the room act the way that they do.” It was not surprising to see nobody go after Radko Gudas after captain Auston Matthews go taken down, but Colby, I know it’s something that of course you as a former player, this kind of shit fires you up.
Colby Cohen: I hate it, man. I know [William] Nylander came out after the game and said he should have done something and Morgan Rielly said he should have done something, but let me just tell you something. Talk is fucking cheap. It is really cheap in this regard. Think about when a player takes a run at Schaefer on Long Island, who’s a star. Think about when a player takes a run at Connor Bedard, right? Think about the response to all those different things. Look, I sat here and I said a couple of weeks ago that as much as we all criticize Auston Matthews in the outer world of hockey… I wanted to point out in that same breath, Tyler, there’s a reason this guy has been named a captain of an NHL franchise and the captain of the U.S. Olympic team by people who we would all agree know what they’re doing. You saw the way the American players in the Olympics, Tyler, all they wanted to do was say “You were wrong about Auston Matthews,” right? There’s obviously something inside of the room that we don’t know about which makes Auston Matthews whatever type of leader he is, but when your captain and your franchise pillar and one of the greatest goal scorers we have in the National Hockey League… takes a hit like that, the fact that players aren’t coming off the bench in a season that is lost to defend him. Boy, that says a lot about the room in Toronto, and I am shocked that Craig Berube’s team has fallen so far.
You can watch the full segment and the rest of the episode here…