Breaking: Another suspension coming after one dirty useless hit?

The National Hockey League Department of Player Safety has just announced that Ottawa Senators defenseman Mark Borowiecki will have a hearing on Wednesday for the elbowing incident in Tuesday’s game against the Boston Bruins. 

Many people expected the Department of Player Safety to make this call following the brutal hit. The Bruins first round pick in the 2017 NHL Draft Urho Vaakanainen left the contest with a concussion and did not return for the end of the game. And it was all because of Borowiecki…

After logging 26-plus minutes Friday night on the Providence blue line, the young defending prospect got the call to join the Bruins in Vancouver and made his debut against the Canucks on Saturday night. The Bruins recalled the 19-year-old from Joensuu, Finland, on an emergency basis after McAvoy fell ill, and Miller injured his hand Thursday in Edmonton.

On Saturday, he skated 17 shifts for 12:26, all but 33 seconds of it at even strength. He was in the lineup tonight against the Senators, however Borowiecki hit the rookie with an elbow to the face and the poor guy was left shaken up to eventually retire to the dressing room. You can see the hit in the short video here below:

You can see the full sequence of events in the video atop this article. 

Many wondered if the hit was a cheap play from the Sens’ veteran defenseman. It looks like Borowiecki was trying to protect his goalie Craig Andersen, however, it sure seems unnecessary to hit the poor rookie the way he did.  No penalty was called on the play. Vaakanainen appeared a bit dazed after the play. He left the ice but remained on the bench, but failed to play a shift in the second period following the hit. 

While we sure hoped the young defenseman was taken off the ice as precaution to make sure he feels no rough symptoms from the concussion, the Bruins later announced that Vaakanainen has already been diagnosed with a concussion…

The hit is surely not a good look for Borowieckiy because you can clearly see him look at Vaakanainen as he skates in and deliberately raise his elbow to hit him in the head.

Following the hit, TSN Director of Scouting Craig Button was quick to call for a suspension calling his actions, an “unacceptable elbow.”

"Absolutely he's going to miss games, it should be at least two games, who knows, it might even be more than that. If you look at this play, it's an ambush elbow to the head of Vaakanainen. Clearly, Borowiecki knows exactly what he is doing. He eyes him up and then he throws in the elbow right up into the face of Vaakanainen. So Mark had some issues with the Department of Safety on the way they deal with supplementary discipline on the bigger stronger guy.

"But guess what? You're not getting on the carpet because you're the bigger stronger guy, you're getting on the carpet because you broke the rules!"

The Senators lost the game to the Bruins and potentially Borowiecki for a few more due to suspension... we will know more later today.