TORONTO – New York Islanders defenseman Andy Sutton has been suspended for two games, without pay, for an incident in NHL game #738 against Pittsburgh Penguins forward Pascal Dupuis, Tuesday night, the National Hockey League announced today.

Under the terms of the Collective Bargaining Agreement, and based on his average annual salary, Sutton will forfeit $31,088.08. The money goes to the Players' Emergency Assistance Fund.

Sutton was assessed a major penalty and game misconduct for boarding at 17:05 of the third period. Dupuis was injured on the play.

Sutton will miss Thursday's game against Florida and Jan. 23 against New Jersey. He will be eligible to return Jan. 26 against Washington.

Islanders' Sutton suspended for two games - NHL.com - News

It wasn't a dirty hit in the sense of Sutton wanted to hurt someone, but it was definitely boarding and he deserved the major.

I read somewhere his comments that he was really sorry, and Sutton and Dupuis know each other from their time in Atlanta so there's no bad blood there.

So long as the NHL is consistent with 2 game suspensions for these types of hits, I see no problems with the suspension.

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It doesn't really look like it was intended to be a big hit. A lot of the damage had to do with the fact that he caught the edge of the boards. Obviously it was boarding, but it was also just unfortunate how his face hit the boards.


Funny thing was, the NHL didn't suspend Gonchar when he delivered an obvious dirty hit to head with intent to cause injury..



And yet they continue to preach this "No more hits to head"

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This is the type of incident I'm eluding to.

And Sutton doesn't even have a track record of this sort of thing...if it's 2 games, fine, but suspend everybody consistently for 2 games.

IMHO, the recent hits of Jovanovski and now Sutton weren't as bad as some such as Gonchar's. But, nothing is perfect and I think the NHL is keeping the current standard around the same place.