Things got a little heated last night on the West Coast during a Toronto Maple Leafs/San Jose Sharks contest.
It was chippy throughout the game, which included Maple Leafs’ forward Nazem Kadri in the middle of it. Despite being in different conferences and in different parts of North America, there was still a target on Kadri’s back.
Nazem Kadri feels Sharks targeted him because of January fight v Joe Thornton:
"Figure you'd turn the page eventually, but I'm not the kind of guy to back down so I was fine with it."
— Mark Masters (@markhmasters) November 16, 2018
Kadri believes that the Sharks targeted him because he fought Joe Thornton in January. Last night, In an altercation with San Jose’s Melker Karlsson, Kadri did his best Jose Bautista impression.
Kadri was a raging bull late in the third period with the Maple Leafs up 5-3. First, he took care of Evander Kane by driving him into the boards with a clean check. Then, he had his crosshairs on Melker Karlsson. Karlsson was trying to grab the puck when Kadri dumped him into the boards.
The pair started pushing and shoving at the side of the net. It eventually leads to Kadri giving shots to Karlsson. Kadri then took Karlsson’s stick and chucked it away, a la Joey Bats.
Even the commentators noticed that the Sharks had been on Kadri the entire the game. In the replay, we can see Karlsson giving shots to Kadri before he retaliated and tossed his stick.
Kadri wasn’t shaken up by the play and even had some choice words for the Sharks after the game.
Kadri: "It seemed like they were pretty agitated to start so I figured I'd just try and use that to my advantage. I think they may have been a little too worried about the wrong thing out there so we took care of business. Good win for us."
— Mark Masters (@markhmasters) November 16, 2018
The two clubs will play their second and final game against one another at the end of the month on November 28th, in Toronto.
