Tom Wilson Shocked By Backlash From Rangers Incident

Tom Wilson was the talk of the NHL world this week after he went after Rangers players Pavel Buchnevich and Artemi Panarin following a net-front scrum. After Wilson was not slapped with a suspension by the NHL, the Rangers condemned the league with a long statement, and then fired their president and general manager.

While a lot has happened in the wake of Tom Wilsons’ dirty play, he doesn’t really understand what all the fuss is about.

“After the play, I would have never thought that all this would have blown up,” Wilson said Friday via The Athletic. “It seemed like a fairly routine hockey scrum to me, and I think that was kind of the feeling from both players in the box. And then, obviously, it took on a new life after the game.”

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Wilson said his actions were a product of him defending his goalie.

“Their guy goes to our net and kicks at our goalie and goes in there with his stick,” Wilson said, referring to Buchnevich. “At a young age in hockey, you’re taught to stand up for your goalie so that’s what I was doing.

“From there, you have guys jumping on your back, and I think anybody’s first reaction would be to just throw them off you and wrestle them down to the ice. Obviously, those scrums are chaotic and there’s lots of stuff going on, but I didn’t think too much of it at the time. But nothing I say right now is going to change anybody’s opinion; they’ve already made that up and I’ve just got to keep moving forward.”

Wilson would also say that he’s aware of all the talk surrounding him on social media.

“It’s obviously been a crazy couple days,” said Wilson, easily the most polarizing figure in the game today. “The good thing about social media is you’re able to close it and go about your life and worry about playing hockey and worry about what’s going on in this room. I’m sure it was pretty bad and, obviously, there was a reaction that I saw a little bit of, but I try not to pay too much attention to that.”

After Artemi Panarin was ruled out for the rest of the season, Tom Wilson claimed he reached out to the Rangers’ star.

“He’s better,” Wilson said. “I reached out to him and that’s really what matters right now.”

While Tom Wilson might want this whole situation to go away pretty soon, I don’t think that’s going to happen.

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