Philadelphia Flyers–Ottawa Senators brawl
The events were precipitated by an incident in the previous meeting between the two teams, when Ottawa's Martin Havlat had swung his stick at Mark Recchi's head.As they skated off to the penalty box, Brashear became involved in another scrap, and the rest of the players on the ice for each team, including goaltenders Robert Esche and Patrick Lalime, began to fight.At the start of the 2005–06 season, the NHL introduced a rule that punished anyone instigating a fight in the final five minutes of a game with a one-game suspension, in order to prevent similar incidents occurring in the future.[2] When the two sides met in late-February, a week before the brawl game, during the third period, Flyers winger Mark Recchi was following Martin Havlát of the Senators when he crossed into the Philadelphia defensive zone.In the second period, an early tripping penalty against Ottawa's Mike Fisher put the Flyers on the power play, during which Kim Johnsson extended Philadelphia's lead to 4–1.A Flyers penalty against Radovan Somík for slashing Martin Havlat resulted in a power play goal for the Senators' Zdeno Chára, closing the score to a two-goal gap once again.Simpson returned to the box soon after, for slashing Michal Handzuš, but Philadelphia's power play was cut short when they received a penalty for having too many men on the ice."[8] The fight left Ray bloodied, and as Brashear was being escorted off the ice by the linesman, he exchanged blows with both Brian Pothier and Todd Simpson.[12] The two teams combined for 419 penalty minutes, an NHL record, breaking the previous total of 406 in a 1981 game between the Boston Bruins and the Minnesota North Stars."[1] The media drew comparisons between the game and the "Broad Street Bullies" era of the Philadelphia Flyers in the 1970s, when they played very aggressive hockey with numerous fights.[13][14][15] At the conclusion of the game Bobby Clarke, Philadelphia's general manager, attempted to enter the Senators' dressing room to confront their head coach, Jacques Martin, but was restrained by a colleague."[18] That mindset echoed the comments made by Ken Hitchcock and Mark Recchi about Martin Havlat,[19] and Sam Donnellon of the Philadelphia Daily News suggested that it was prevailing opinion amongst all the players in the League.[20] Mike Heika of The Dallas Morning News also believed that the league should be stricter in handing out fines and suspensions, suggesting that Hitchcock should possibly have been penalised for his revenge comments, and that if Havlat had received a lengthier ban for his actions, the brawl between the Flyers and Senators may not have happened.In the ensuing NHL season in October 2005, the ECHL rule, with an additional fine on the offending player's head coach of $10,000, was implemented.
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