PITTSBURGH – You don’t often get this kind of candor from an NHL player in the middle of the playoffs. But Penguins winger Chris Kunitz all but apologized for his cross check to the jaw of Caps goalie Simeon Varlamov in the final seconds of Game 2 on Monday night.
The hit went unnoticed by the referees — partly because it came in the middle of a wild scramble that eventually led to a Penguins goal by Sidney Crosby with 31 seconds left. Kunitz was fined an undisclosed amount by the NHL, but admitted he was lucky to dodge a suspension.
“No. It looks bad on tape. It definitely does. It’s something that I’m definitely not proud of. You don’t want to do that. You don’t want to ever injure anybody. Fortunately he wasn’t. But its something where I was going to the net, trying to make space. Unfortunately I hit him. It’s something the league is going against right now — hits to the head. I was very fortunate [not to be suspended]. But you still have to go out there and play.”
I then asked Kunitz if there was a fine line between what he did and still finding ways to make a goalie — especially a 21-year-old rookie — uncomfortable.
“You don’t want to make contact with the goalie. Probably would have been a penalty on the play if the refs would have seen it. It’s something that would have hurt our team. And I don’t want to hurt our team in any fashion. But I still want to go to the net. It was what it was, but it won’t probably happen again anytime soon.”
