There are few better ways to start a game than how Kaiden Guhle started his against the Vancouver Canucks on Monday. In the first shift of Montreal Canadiens defenseman Kaiden Guhle’s game, he gave his team some much-needed energy with one of the best open-ice hits we’ve seen this season—and everyone was saying the exact same thing about it on social media afterwards.
The Canadiens came off an OT win over the Colorado Avalanche on Saturday, looking for back-to-back victories on Monday against the Vancouver Canucks. Kaiden Guhle showed right away that the Canadiens were serious from the start.
At the end of his first shift of the game, the big defenseman charged through the neutral zone and caught Canucks rookie Jonathan Lekkerimäki, who had his head down.
Kaiden Guhle’s amazing hit
He lowered his shoulder and delivered one of the biggest hits this season, launching Lekkerimäki with a play that sent shockwaves through the arena.
”He buries people,” Cole Caufield said about his teammate post-game.
“Obviously got us going in the first with that big hit.”
Fans were thrilled by Guhle’s hit, and the video of the impressive physical play went viral on social media. Many also noticed another detail of the incident that fans adored: nobody came rushing after Guhle to retaliate against him for the hit.
”A clean hit with no goons jumping in after? Hell yeah,” one said.
”Is it a clean NHL hit if a line brawl doesn’t immediately start?” another said.
”Clean monster hit. No fight immediately following. This pleases us,” a third added.
Overall, fans were delighted by the sequence.
”There’s nothing more satisfying to me than when a big hit is cleanly done too,” one said.
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