The Cup Finals Are Leaving a Nasty Mark

The image remained seared into Stanley Cup memory the day after Vancouver’s Aaron Rome flattened Boston’s Nathan Horton with a thunderous shoulder five minutes into the Bruins’ 8-1 victory Monday night: Horton lying motionless on the ice, his eyes staring blankly at the TD Garden ceiling, his arm upright, frozen frighteningly in position as the Bruins’ medical staff rushed out to care for him while Rome headed to the dressing room with a five-minute interference major and a game misconduct.

It was a scene not altogether uncommon in the N.H.L., in which more than 80 concussions were reported during the regular season. But the ugly incident took place on the game’s biggest stage.

On Tuesday, Rome was suspended by the N.H.L. for four games, the longest suspension in Cup finals history, starting with Wednesday’s Game 4.

Horton returned home after spending the night at Massachusetts General Hospital with what the Bruins termed a severe concussion. He is expected to miss the rest of the series.

Mike Murphy, the league’s senior vice president for hockey operations, said Rome was not suspended for hitting Horton in the head. Instead, he was suspended for hitting Horton long after Horton had passed the puck away — “close to a second late,” Murphy said — combined with the severity of the injury Horton sustained.

“This has nothing to do with Rule 48,” Murphy said, citing the rule against blindside checks to the head enacted this season in an effort to reduce concussions. He said that Rome’s check was a “north/south” hit, which is legal under Rule 48 even if the head is struck.

“This is just an interference penalty, an interference hit,” Murphy said. “If it had come immediately after he released the puck, it would be a legal hit. We have them all the time.”

The N.H.L. is one of the world’s last junior or senior leagues to allow some form of contact with the head. The International Ice Hockey Federation, the N.C.A.A., the Ontario Hockey League and all European domestic leagues have imposed bans on head contact.

Murphy said that the taunting and chippiness that has marked this series — much an outgrowth of the incident in which Vancouver’s Alexandre Burrows bit the finger of Boston’s Patrice Bergeron in Game 1, followed by episodes in which players on both teams thrust their fingers toward opponents’ mouths, culminating in a rash of misconduct penalties at the end of Game 3 — was garbage.

“I will be speaking with both general managers and coaches before the day is over about what we are seeing, the garbage that is going on,” he said.

Murphy is in charge of discipline for this series because the league’s chief disciplinarian, Colin Campbell, has recused himself. Campbell is the father of Bruins forward Gregory Campbell.

Murphy met with Rome on Tuesday morning and said Rome “felt it was a hockey play, a hockey play that went bad — those are my words, not his, but that’s basically what he said.”

Rome sustained a concussion during Vancouver’s previous series when he was checked from behind into the boards by San Jose’s Jamie McGinn, who received a five-minute major but was not suspended.

“I want to express my concern for Nathan’s well being and wish him a quick and full recovery,” Rome said in a statement released by the Canucks. “I try to play this game honestly and with integrity. As someone who has experienced this type of injury, I am well aware of its serious nature and have no desire for another player to experience it. I will not take away my teammates’ focus on the task at hand and intend to speak at an appropriate time.”

Canucks Coach Alain Vigneault described the hit as a “north/south play” and said that Horton was “looking at his pass,” implying that he left himself vulnerable.

“Aaron was a tad late,” Vigneault said. “Aaron isn’t a dirty player, never has been, never will be. It was a hit that unfortunately turned bad,” he said.

“In my opinion it’s not the right call,” said Vigneault, citing McGinn’s hit on Rome and a first-round incident in which Chicago’s Ben Eager checked Daniel Sedin into the boards from behind as examples of hits that did not result in suspensions. Vigneault said that Rome was very emotional. “He’s very disappointed,” Vigneault added.

Bruins Coach Claude Julien said it was “important” that the league “protect our players from those kinds of hits.”

Bruins center Marc Savard has been out almost two years with a pair of concussions. Bergeron, also a center, is playing despite having sustained three concussions since 2007, including one that sidelined him at the start of the previous series this spring with Tampa Bay.

Murphy, who endured criticism earlier in the series for not suspending Burrows, said he was unhappy about having to make a ruling in the Rome-Horton incident.

“We’ve got one young man in the hospital and one young man taken out of the final,” Murphy said. “There’s no lightness about it. There’s no fun to this. There’s no enjoyment to this. Nobody wins in this. Everybody loses. The fans lose. We lost two good hockey players.”

SLAP SHOTS

Claude Julien said the rookie Tyler Seguin would probably take Nathan Horton’s place in Game 4. Seguin was a healthy scratch for the first two rounds but had three goals and three assists in his first two postseason appearances, against Tampa Bay. But he did little afterward and was scratched again for Game 3. His place was taken by Shawn Thornton, who was effective on the Bruins’ fourth line. Seguin could take Horton’s place on the first line, or, more likely, Julien will go with Rich Peverley or Michael Ryder, both of whom played well in Horton’s place Monday. Peverley had an assist, and Ryder had a goal and two assists.


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