GOALIE FIGHT! Jonathan Roy vs Bobby Nadeau, Does Anyone Win?

I don’t claim to be a QMJHL fan. I follow the OHL, I watch the Memorial Cup, but that’s pretty well where my relationship with the CHL (Canadian Hockey League) ends.

Watching this fight however, really got me going today!

In the interest of full disclosure, I’m a huge Patrick Roy fan. I loved him when he played, I loved him when he coached the Ramparts to a loss against my Peterborough Petes in the 2006 Memorial Cup. The guy is the greatest goalie of all time and a total ego-manic, what’s not to love?

Further disclosure will reveal that I also like a good hockey fight (as most fans do)!

This takes us to the current playoffs, game two, Ramparts vs Sagueneens. Chicoutimi goes up 7-1 in the second period and shit break loose. Players pair off, Ramparts goalie Jonathan Roy rushes opposing goalie Bobby Nadeau, hilarity ensues.

As stated, I’m all for hockey fights. And we’ve seen some pretty classic goalie fights in our day (one of the most notable was the one and only Patrick Roy vs Chris Osgood – one of the best commentating jobs I’ve ever heard on a fight… ahem)

So you have to think, was little Johnny (no pun intended) just trying to impress daddy?

Probably!

Either way, anyone getting their knickers in a knot needs to look at this as what it was, a hockey moment. Whatever, call me a bigot, but I think Roy was reacting to the crowd and certainly it didn’t help that he had just been served his ass for seven goals! He figured he would win back his pride in a fight. And if that was the objection… I think he faired pretty well.

Okay, so “Nadeau wasn’t interested in fighting“, you say? Well you’re probably right. But when Sébastien Rioux jumped off the bench to take on a blood thirsty Roy, maybe he should have been better prepared! We’re talking about a lot of extra equipment here and a guy who’s already just thrown about 20 some-odd punches. Roy handled himself pretty well.

So I’m going to go ahead and tip my hat to Jonathan Roy, but in the same breath, say that he should probably be suspended and very likely will.

As for coach/father Patrick Roy. People need to just let it be. Patrick has said some pretty outrageous things about teams and leagues and has shown in the past that he’s not exactly an A+ ambassador for the game. However I don’t think this was an issue of father/son “whatever”, that the media is making it out to be. Any coach would have let that happen the same way. Down 7-1, if your players want to fight, you just keep your mouth shut and let them go. That’s what he did.

So does anyone win? Probably not Roy (either of them), definitely not Nadeau or Rioux. Maybe the Sagueneens if they can capitalize on an imminent Roy suspension, not to mention the momentum from the incident and a 10-1 victory on the road.

Regardless, hockey is what it is. That’s why we love it. If you want to know who really won, it’s probably the fans. We have more to watch, more to blog about, more to talk about.

And isn’t that what makes the game great?