Sam Bennett vs. Boston, to be continued

Bennett sidelines Brad Marchand in Game 3, scores a decisive, disputed Game 4 goal as Florida leads the Bruins, 3-1.

One of Saturday Night Live’s better forays into sports was a debate on this proposition: Derek Jeter Sucks Or, No, I Don’t.

Jeter played the part of Jeter. Cast member Seth Meyers, wearing a Red Sox hat, argued the other side. Jeter went first and earnestly described his daily approach to the game, his consistency, his winning, and his outreach into the community. Therefore, I don’t suck.

Meyers then leaned over, his nose almost pressing against Jeter’s Adam’s apple, and yelled the same thing he might yell on a hot Sunday afternoon in Fenway: “Yeeeewwww Suuuuuuuck!” Restraining laughter was impossible, especially for Jeter.

Most fans of particular teams have the retribution gene, but Boston’s fans have the memory of Jeopardy champions. It’s hard to wrest their villains out of their cold, dead hands. Bucky Dent is still not welcome. Neither is Roger Goodell, Michael Cooper, World B. Free, either Manning brother, Ulf Samuelsson  or any number of Montreal Canadiens.

The new debate in Boston is Sam Bennett Is A Thug Or, No, He Isn’t, and it’s fairly lopsided. In Game 3 of the Eastern Conference semifinals, Bennett punched out the Bruins’ Brad Marchand, who wears the black hat to 31 other NHL rinks. Marchand did not play in Game 4 Sunday, which Boston was leading, 2-1. Then Bennett approached the side of the Bruins’ net and cross-checked Charlie Coyle, who fell into the lap of goaltender Jeremy Swayman. The puck dropped to Bennett’s stick, which slapped it into the net and tied the game. The replay cameras were consulted, and the NHL film critics determined there was no goaltender interference. Florida’s Alexander Barkov later won it, 3-2, for a 3-1 lead in the series.

The NHL doesn’t expound on such decisions, so the issue must have been the force in which Bennett hit Coyle from behind. If one believes that Coyle merely fell, like one of Sean Connery’s paddy-wagon mates in “Family Business,” it’s possible to buy the decision. If one is dealing with reality, it’s not. Boston coach Jim Montgomery, whose bald head turned Mother’s Day pink when he was castigating the officials, said that Coyle would have cleared the puck if left unattended. Swayman had been one of the best goalies in the playoffs and would have had a chance to push off and stop Bennett’s shot, without Coyle’s unscheduled landing.

“Coyle was pushed into me,” Swayman said. “I couldn’t play my position. So that’s that.”

This is where hockey becomes a sequel to “Rashomon,” the 1950 movie that showed how two people (or, in its case, four) could see the same thing and draw different conclusions. Bennett said he wasn’t a bit surprised that the goal was allowed. “I’m putting that puck into the net before Swayman can get over, whether Coyle was there or not,” he said.

Paul Maurice, Florida’s mischievous and sometimes hilarious coach, batted away the indignant questions as if he were John McEnroe at the net.“The only thing I was particularly concerned about was some of your foreheads, right now,” Maurice deadpanned. “I think there’s been lots of energy on this, lots of coverage. And I think you’ve lost your minds on it. Which is fine. You have that right. I don’t mean to offend you when I say things like that, but we don’t always share the same opinion on what happens on the ice, and I am absolutely partisan, one hundred percent. Sometimes I feel you guys are, too.”

Bennett’s Game 3 hit on Marchand also got some more specific illustration, from different camera angles. Marchand was not immediately sidelined by the hit, but later went off after he made contact with Florida’s Kevin Stenlund. Marchand is the captain, the drink-stirrer, the disturber, and the author of 138 points in 155 playoff games. The Bruins aren’t the Bruins without him. The original angle suggested that Marchand was lining up Bennett, who had just recovered from his own injury, and that Bennett noticed just in time to lower his shoulder into Marchand’s face, the dreaded “reverse hit.” But the new angle indicated that Bennett also popped Marchand with a subtle right hand.

This is at least a change of narrative for Bennett, who was the fourth overall pick in the 2014 draft and played minor junior for coach Brian McDavid, father of Connor. “He always had an edge, even then,” McDavid has said. That edge didn’t translate immediately into goals and assists when Bennett made the Calgary Flames.  Stuck in the bottom six, Bennett requested a trade in 2021, and Florida only had to give up a second-round pick and a prospect named Emil Heineman.

“Everyone should play a little more like Sam Bennett,” Maurice said in March. “He has this very good blend of strong speed. He’s an unusual center iceman because he covers the spectrum of style of play. We don’t like it when he’s out of our lineup.”

Bennett is hardly the only Calgary alumnus who is thriving in the postseason for another franchise, or has made an appearance at least. Only two seasons ago, the Flames had Matthew Tkachuk (now with Florida), Noah Hanifin (Vegas), Tyler Toffoli (Winnipeg), Chris Tanev (Dallas), Elias Lindholm (Vancouver) and Nikita Zadorov (Vancouver). That doesn’t count Johnny Gaudreau, who is in Columbus. Needless to say, the Flames weren’t in this year’s playoffs.

Meanwhile, Edmonton and Vancouver are tangling to see which team will be the sole Canadian survivor in the league’s final four. No Canadian team has won the Stanley Cup since the 1993 Canadiens. Until the buzzer sounded in Game 3 Sunday, the story was Vancouver’s Arturs Silovs, a rookie goalie who led Latvia to a bronze medal in the World Championships and earned his own statue in Riga. Silovs is only playing because Thatcher Demko is hurt, and he’ll go back to wearing the baseball cap when Demko returns. But his persistence saved the Canucks in a 3-2 win that gave them a 2-1 series lead.

The path of the series might have changed when the game ended. Behind the net, McDavid was arguing with defenseman Carson Soucy and whacked Soucy on the leg with his stick. Soucy then nailed McDavid with a cross-check to the throat just as Zadorov was cross-checking him from behind, a tag-team effect that will get some attention from the recruiting department of WWE, even though McDavid skated off with no obvious aftereffect. On Monday the Department of Player Safety gave Zadorov a light $5,000 slap, but beckoned Soucy for a hearing. That usually menas a suspension, which would significantly weaken Vancouver.

Meanwhile the Panthers continue to roll toward a presumed Eastern Conference Final with the New York Rangers, who can eliminate Carolina in Madison Square Garden Monday night. Such a top-end series could warrant a Netflix seven-parter. For Sam Bennett the priority is to win Game 5 at home, somehow, some way. A loss puts him back on a plane to Boston, where he might as well be wearing an orange jumpsuit, if not pinstripes.