Toronto Maple Leafs forward Wayne Simmonds was a man on a mission during Saturday’s 7-1 victory against the Montreal Canadiens and sent a strong message in the process: he’s not going to allow anyone to bully his linemates.
Simmonds may be playing in his final home game with the Maple Leafs — a notion that head coach Sheldon Keefe adamantly rejected Saturday morning — and he made life hell for the Canadiens.
Shortly after the Maple Leafs took a 2-0 lead, the Canadiens desperately tried to switch the momentum and it backfired badly. Canadiens winger Michael Pezzetta challenged Simmonds to a fight and promptly got rocked, much to the delight of the Scotiabank Arena crowd.
Simmonds wasn’t done there. Michael Bunting was cross-checked after the whistle by Canadiens defenseman Joel Edmundson during the third period. Bunting didn’t retaliate, as part of a concerted effort to avoid penalties and the scorn of referees across the league. Simmonds, however, wasn’t having any of it and immediately took on Edmundson. Johnathan Kovacevic tried to intervene on Edmundson’s behalf, but it didn’t stop Simmonds from wrestling him to the ground.
For his efforts, Simmonds earned a raucous ovation from the home crowd and the continued adoration of his teammates, who bestowed him with the Player of the Game belt following the victory.
“He still scares the s—t out of people,” Maple Leafs forward Mitch Marner said of Simmonds to Mike Stephens of The Hockey News after Saturday’s morning skate.
“It’s nice to have that on your team at all times. And when he speaks in this room, everyone listens.”
Simmonds, for his part, is looking forward to the challenge of taking on the Tampa Bay Lightning in the playoffs.
“We lost to them last year, right? I think any time you lose to a team you have it in your head that you want to come back bigger, better, stronger, faster. Fortunately, we get the matchup against them again. They’ve played until June the last three years,” Simmonds told Yahoo Sports.
It doesn’t appear that Simmonds has played his final game with the Maple Leafs. If he did, Saturday was one hell of a sendoff that both the Maple Leafs and the Canadiens won’t forget for diametrically different reasons.
