It's been 11 years since former New York Rangers center Derek Stepan had his jaw broken in the Eastern Conference Final against the Montreal Canadiens . If you think Stepan receives sympathy these days from certain former teammates about how the injury occurred, well, think again.
Of course, you must understand the circumstances of what happened that night of May 22, 2014, at Madison Square Garden. Stepan not only was leveled by a late, open-ice hit in the first period, one that resulted in a broken jaw. But the hit was delivered by Canadiens forward Brandon Prust , Stepan's good friend and former Rangers teammate.
Talk about awkward.
The Canadiens contended Stepan wasn't even really hurt. Doctors said otherwise. X-rays proved the extent of the injury.
Stepan revealed in an interview on the Morning Cuppa Hockey podcast this past week that Prust and former Rangers captain Ryan Callahan still needle him about the controversial hit to this day.
"[Prust] was another one that was at the alum game [recently], him and 'Cally' kept pulling up the video and breaking it down. 'He barely touched you Step. Like, dive a little bit more!' Stepan shared with a laugh.
Prust was not penalized on the play. However, he was suspended two games by the League. And Stepan missed Game 4 following surgery to repair his jaw. Stepan returned in Game 5 wearing a full face shield and scored two goals in a 7-4 loss to the Canadiens, fueling the fire that he wasn't hurt as badly as the Rangers contended.
"It was what it was," Stepan said. "But the best part of it was Cally, he's just relentless this guy. Every angle of that hit. 'I think you got hit in the shoulder, Step.'"
It should be noted that Callahan was an outside observer to the controversy. The Rangers traded Callahan a few months earlier to the Tampa Bay Lightning for future Hall-of-Famer Martin St. Louis . As such, Callahan missed their run to the Stanley Cup Final that spring.
That provides Stepan ammunition of his own to use against Callahan.
"I'll be telling stories about that run and then I'll be like, 'Oh right. You weren't there Cally!"
Related: Derek Stepan reveals how J.T. Miller 'handled taking sh**' from Rangers veterans as rookie
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There are plenty of laughs now, but it wasn't such a funny matter when the incident occurred. The Rangers led the best-of-7 conference final 2-0 after winning the first two games on the road at Bell Centre in Montreal. Prust's massive hit helped propel the Canadiens to a 3-2 overtime win at MSG in Game 3.
Stepan, not surprisingly, wasn't thrilled with the hit.
"'Prusty' is one of my good buddies. I understand Prusty's role. Do I feel I needed to be the target of his role? Probably not, and I tell him that all of the time," Stepan explained. "But I was the target of his role and such is life. I don't think he thought he was going to break my jaw. I think he thought he was just going to give me a little pop, get a little penalty and stir the pot."
Obviously it was worse than that.
"To his credit I think his wires crossed and I was in his cross-hairs and he got me and he broke my jaw and I think he felt terrible about it," Stepan said. "But he also knew this is the way the world works. He also understood I knew that. But he does care about me."
They were Rangers teammates from 2010-12, Stepan's first two seasons in the NHL and likely the two best of Prust's career. The rugged forward signed with the Canadiens before the start of the 2012-13 season.
If Montreal had defeated New York in the 2014 East Final, many north of the border would've contended that the series shifted because of that hit. Instead, the Rangers won Game 4 at MSG on St. Louis ' memorable overtime goal. And after that wild Game 5 loss, the Rangers finished off the Canadiens with a 1-0 Henrik Lundqvist masterpiece in Game 6.
The Rangers lost the Stanley Cup Final in five games to the Los Angeles Kings that spring. It's their only appearance in the Final since winning the Stanley Cup in 1994.
But back to the Stepan-Prust relationship. Stepan summed up why Prust remains his good friend a decade after that infamous hit.
"He was the first guy to text me when I woke up from my surgery. He was right on it, right away. 'Hey buddy, are you OK? Obviously, I didn't mean to,'" Stepan explained. "And the cool thing about Prusty is that, sure, anyone who cheap-shots a guy can text that guy afterwards. That's easy to do, right?
"The next year, I broke my leg in the skate test (in training camp), and I got off the ice, the first text I got was from Prusty. 'Hey, i heard something happened. Are you alright?'
Bygones were bygones. And these two former Rangers — and their captain — can laugh about it all these years later.
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