Throughout the course of this Leafs/Panthers series, the Panthers have taken just about every opportunity they could find to land cheap shots on unsuspecting Leafs players. There were multiple examples of this during last night's Game 4. First, there was this heavy hit by Gudas after the whistle on David Kampf:
Then, at the end of the game, Brandon Montour threw a nasty hit on Morgan Rielly, which caused a huge skirmish. During the scrum, a pair of Panthers threw multiple punches on Jake McCabe, who was down on the ice doing his best to defend himself. Panthers star Matthew Tkachuk also took liberties on Mitch Marner, throwing multiple punches at his former London Knights teammate:
Following the game, Marner was asked about his dust-up with Tkachuk, to which he replied, "I know exactly what he's going to try to do. So, just stay composed. I don't really give a flying you-know-what-the-next-word-is."
Marner and Tkachuk are good friends off the ice and Marner also knows how Tkachuk operates, having played with him in the past. It didn't seem like he was overly concerned or bothered by the play. Still, if the Leafs don't have some kind of a response to Tkachuk's swings at Marner in Game 5 on Friday, it will be a missed opportunity to show the Panthers pest that taking liberties on one of their star players comes with consequences.
