Sabres head coach Ralph Krueger left Philadelphia unhappy about two of his players taking shots to the head area.
In the Flyers' 3-0 win on Tuesday night at the Wells Fargo Center, Buffalo lost its starting goalie Carter Hutton for the third period. Hutton took what appeared to be an inadvertent elbow to the head from Ivan Provorov fewer than two minutes into the second period. Hutton stayed in the game for the rest of the middle stanza but did not return for the third period.
Provorov, who is in his fifth NHL season and has not been suspended in his career, appeared to be knocked off his skates by Sabres defenseman Brandon Montour. It was a physical play that sent the Flyers' defenseman barreling into Hutton. Montour gave Provorov some shots when the blueliner was down in the net after the collision.
Stay in the game with the latest updates on your beloved Philadelphia sports teams! Sign up here for our All Access Daily newsletter.
Here are three screenshots from the play, which you can watch in the highlight above.
Krueger was left frustrated by the play.
"If you look at the way the elbow comes extended, you know what you’re doing, and we'll see where this takes us," the Sabres' head coach said in his postgame interview. "[Hutton's] under assessment here tonight. It was really disappointing in a game the way it was going, to lose midway through the game a very, very strong Carter Hutton. After that, he seemed to didn’t feel the effects of the hit actually, which can happen sometimes until the intermission when he got in and he sat down. I think his adrenaline kind of kept him going. It was a big hit here tonight.
"It’s the fourth game where a player from ours has had, for us, violent hits to the head and hopefully there will be action for this one."
NHL
Prior to Tuesday's game, Nicolas Aube-Kubel was fined $4,633.62 for roughing Buffalo defenseman Rasmus Dahlin in the Flyers' 6-1 loss to the Sabres. Aube-Kubel appeared to give Dahlin a shot to the face at the blue line as the puck was played into the Flyers' offensive zone.
Krueger was disappointed by the fine, as you can read here from the Buffalo News' Lance Lysowski.
Subscribe to and rate Flyers Talk
Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher | Art19 | YouTube