Ottawa Senators defenseman Mark Borowiecki cracked the holder to the blade on his right skate during play against the New Jersey Devils on Saturday night. The poor guy couldn't get his legs under him.
With just over 10 minutes remaining in the game, the Devils dumped the puck into the offensive zone. By the time the TV camera follows the puck, Borowiecki is already down.
The fact that he couldn't stay on his feet wasn't due to a lack of effort. He kept trying and trying to get on his feet, but to no avail.
"When that happens you can't stand up. It's impossible," Borowiecki said.
Finally, after six falls in 35 seconds, officials blew the play dead after some protest from the player.
"(Official) Timmy Peel was so disgusted with me on that shift, he finally blew it down," said Borowiecki, in a light-hearted mood about the incident after the game.
Teammates on the bench got a kick out of seeing him flail around, but he didn't share the laugh until after it was over.
"(After the play) I was just in a bad mood," he said. "I wasn't really paying attention to anyone. I can laugh about it now. It's just one of those flukey things that happens in sports. You can ask any guy who's lost steel on the ice. It's really hard to skate. It's really hard to do anything. So I stood on one leg for as long as I could and I got really tired and the instant that plastic touches the ice, you're going down.
"I'm pretty sure I have two bruised hip bones right now from falling so much," he said.
It was a tough night all around for Borowiecki's skates.
"It's a bit of a tough situation because I'd actually already broken another pair of skates tonight so my backup skates were out of commission too," Borowiecki said. "I broke two holders tonight and Bobby (Ryan) hit me with a shot and blew my tendon guard off my other skate."
That's a pretty tough night all around, but all's well that ends well. The Senators beat the Devils 3-1 and Borowiecki was still in once piece after his debacle even if his skates weren't so lucky.
