The NHL has decided it needs to talk with Dallas Stars defenseman Jason Demers about his elbowing penalty last night that injured Penguins forward Nick Bonino.
Dallas’s Jason Demers will have a hearing today for elbowing Pittsburgh’s Nick Bonino.
— NHL Player Safety (@NHLPlayerSafety) October 23, 2015
Demers received a major and game misconduct for the elbow, which happened in the last five minutes of the Stars 4-1 victory in Pittsburgh. You can see the GIF of the injury in this post.
As I wrote in the comments last night, even though I believe Demers that this was a horribly mis-timed attempted at the Brenden Morrow reversal (which is supported by how off balance he puts himself expecting there to be much more of Bonino behind him to take his weight), the fact remains that it ended up being a chicken-wing style elbow to the head that caused an injury.
Given the very obvious injury, and given that the Department of Player Safety has had a roller-coaster of a year so far, I am expecting a one-game suspension out of this. I’d be fine with that or a maximum fine, honestly, since while I do think he didn’t mean it, it’s still a very dangerous play.
If Demers is suspended, it would provide the opportunity for Patrik Nemeth or Jamie Oleksiak to get into their first game this season.