from Frank Seravalli of Frequent Flyers,

Flyers forward Harry Zolnierczyk was whistled for a 5-minute major “kneeing” penalty with under 30 seconds to play in Wednesday’s 4-1 shellacking after laying out Washington’s Mathieu Perreault in open ice.

Oates’ star player, Alex Ovechkin, took exception to the hit and tangled with Zac Rinaldo.

“It was like, 30 seconds left, 4-1 lead,” Ovechkin said. “Why you have to kill the guy? It was dirty.”

Ovechkin’s coach didn’t feel the same way, more or less saying Ovechkin’s opinion perfectly describes his entire, unimpressive game on Wednesday.

“I don’t think it’s dirty at all,” Oates said. “I think it’s a product of our whole game. There is 30 seconds left, the game’s over, and ‘Matty’ thought he could stickhandle through the team. It’s not what we do, all of us. The atmosphere clearly dropped in the game, it was over and you think you can bang one through the entire team. You just can't. It'll never work that way.”

read on and watch the hit below...