McDavid, Myers suspended 3 games for cross-checks

Edmonton Oilers captain Connor McDavid and Vancouver Canucks defenseman Tyler Myers were both suspended three games for their cross-checks during Saturday's contest, the NHL's Department of Player Safety announced Monday.

Both incidents occurred in the final seconds of Edmonton's 3-2 loss. McDavid first caught Canucks forward Conor Garland up high, and Myers hit Oilers rearguard Evan Bouchard off the ensuing scrum.

McDavid and Myers were handed match penalties, which are automatically reviewed by the league.

McDavid and Garland got tangled up with Edmonton pushing to tie the game. Garland avoided a penalty for pinning McDavid, and the superstar responded with a cross-check.

The league found that McDavid retaliated "aggressively and intentionally, escalating the altercation by raising his stick significantly and creating this contact ... with sufficient force to merit supplemental discipline."

As for Myers, the Department of Player Safety asserted that the blue-liner delivered an "intentional cross-check" to Bouchard's head that warranted a ban.

Myers said he didn't mean to hit Bouchard up high.

"I'm not ignorant of how it looked in real time," he said, per Postmedia's Ben Kuzma. "If you slow (the video) down, I start lower and as he brought his hands up, it kind of redirected my stick up.

"I never intended to hit him in the face and I've never cross-checked anybody in the face in my whole career."

The league acknowledged Myers' assertion but argued that "players are responsible for their stick at all times."

This is the second suspension of McDavid's 688-game NHL career. He was previously banned for two games in 2019 for an illegal check to the head.

Myers, meanwhile, has now been suspended three times during his 1,040-game career. He got three games for boarding in 2012 and another three for a hit to the head in 2014.

McDavid is eligible to return next Monday against the Seattle Kraken, while Myers can re-enter the lineup the same day versus the St. Louis Blues.

Both will be serving the second game of their suspensions when the Oilers and Canucks meet again on Thursday.