Ryan Reaves has now served his five-game suspension and finally broke his silence on his controversial hit on Darnell Nurse. To no surprise, he was crystal clear about his thoughts on the Oilers defenseman’s comments.
Reaves was suspended for five games after delivering a crushing hit on Darnell Nurse, which made direct contact with the defenseman’s head, in a game on November 16th.
Nurse was down on the ice for several minutes and eventually needed assistance off the ice, and he didn’t return to the game. Reaves was assessed a match penalty for the hit, and the Department of Player Safety later suspended him for five games.
Ryan Reaves breaks his silence
Since then, Reaves hadn’t spoken to reporters or the media about his thoughts on the hit. But on Tuesday, after serving his five-game suspension, he finally broke his silence.
“Just took a couple of inches too bad of an angle and caught him,” he said via TSN’s Mark Masters. “Just an unfortunate incident that, if I’m a second later, I catch body. Obviously, something you don’t want to see, but just a split second too early.”
Reaves didn’t want to get into if the length of the suspension was fair.
“I don’t want to get into that,” he said. “I already told the kids that Christmas is cancelled, and I don’t want to get fined again. It’s over, and we’re just going to leave it at that.”
Reaves slams back at Nurse
During Reaves’ suspension, Darnell Nurse made comments about the hit. He wasn’t happy about it and stated that it was ‘pretty obvious’ that Reaves intended to hurt him. But now, Reaves responds.
“The only truth he spoke was that I go out there to inflict pain,” he said. “That’s a fact, and that’s not going to stop, but I’m going to continue to do it legally.
“Yeah, I’m going to keep playing hard, if not harder now, and I’m going to keep burying guys. When you get caught by somebody, I think you’re entitled to your opinion, and that’s fine. But I think my 900 games and however many thousands of hits I have speak for themselves. I play physically every game, and I’ve been doing it for 15 years with only a couple of suspensions.”
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