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The Pittsburgh Penguins staved off elimination for the second straight game with a clutch Game 5 win over the Philadelphia Flyers on Monday night, but celebrations were briefly halted when a skirmish erupted over a controversial hit on Sidney Crosby after the final buzzer.
Flyers forward Travis Konecny found himself at the center of the scrum — and the controversy — after he appeared to cross-check Sidney Crosby after the game ended, marking the second incident involving Konecny this series to draw criticism.
A massive fight broke out with Crosby and Konecny at the bottom of the pileup.
Eventually, the players were separated, but fans on social media called out Konecny for his “dirty” plays in the first-round series.
“No way Konecny would deliver one of the cheapest cross checks on Crosby to end the game,” one person wrote on X.
“Examples are too numerous [to] count. But another example of the garage league @NHL @NHLPlayerSafety not protecting its stars and players,” another person added. “Nobody has ever bought a ticket or tuned in to watch Travis Konecny. A fine or supplemental discipline should occur. But won’t.”
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The Athletic’s Josh Yohe even accused Konecny of hitting Crosby with “clear intent to injure.”
“It’s a nasty series and both teams have crossed lines. But no one has been cheaper/more dirty in this series than Konecny, whose cross check of Crosby after the game had ended was clear intent to injure. Earlier in this series, Konecny tried to kick Rust. Very dirty player.”
The “kick” Yohe referenced took place in Game 3.
Konecny appeared to kick Bryan Rust during an altercation, but he denied it, telling reporters during his postgame presser that he did not recall any kicking.
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Connor Dewar, Kris Letang, and Elmer Soderblom scored and Crosby had two assists on Monday night to cut the Flyers’ lead to 3-2 and force Game 6 on Wednesday.
“I think that’s something we pride ourselves on all year. Throughout the season we’ve been in different situations and I think that we’ve done a great job of handling adversity and again here, we’re faced with more,” Crosby said after the win. “It doesn’t get any easier, so we know it’s a big challenge going into there. But we have a lot of belief in our group, we’ve done it time and time again.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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