from Stu Cowan of the Montreal Gazette,

“I didn’t mean to hurt him.”

Those words are spoken by just about every NHL player who is suspended for injuring an opponent and the Canadiens’ Max Domi is no exception.

“It’s a real tough situation, obviously, for everyone involved,” Domi said after practice Friday in Brossard about being suspended by the NHL for five pre-season games after sucker-punching Florida defenceman Aaron Ekblad in the face during a 5-2 loss to the Panthers Wednesday night at the Bell Centre. “I feel bad about it. It’s not the way I wanted to handle that. It’s an emotional game. Obviously, I’m an emotional player. I’ve known Aaron for a long time. Grew up playing against each other. We always play hard, always battle, whether it was in minor hockey, junior, the national level and now the NHL, too. By no means did I want to hurt him.”

There it is.

Of course Domi wanted to hurt Ekblad … that’s the idea behind punching someone in the face. Maybe he wasn’t planning to break the defenceman’s nose and leave him on the ice in a pool of blood, but that’s what happened.

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