NHL veteran Johnny Boychuk has been left needing 90 stitches on his face after being involved in a gruesome incident which saw his face cut by the blade of an opponent's skate.
The incident occurred during the third quarter of the New York Islanders' clash against the Montreal Canadiens when Montreal's Artturi Lehkonen fell in front of Boychuk.
As Lehkonen fell to the ice, his legs flew up, with the blade of his skate slashing Boychuk's face.
The 36-year-old immediately crashed to the ice before skating off to get assistance from the medical team.
After the terrible injury, Islanders' team president and general manager Lou Lamoriello revealed that Boychuk had to get 90 stitches as a result of the incident.
"There's been no damage to his eye," he said. "He felt the skate blade hit his eye, but fortunately just got the eyelid."
Boychuk finally broke his silence on the incident, taking to his personal Twitter account, where he even managed to see the funny side of his injury.
https://twitter.com/joboych/status/1235303830339932161?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1235303830339932161&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F2020%2F03%2F04%2Fus%2Fjohnny-boychuk-islanders-eye-stitches-spt-trnd%2Findex.html"Thank you to everyone for the positive messages and thoughts!" he wrote.
"I am extremely grateful! Please know they did not go unheard.
"Luckily for me the skate only cut my eyelid. Sorry for the late response ... facial recognition wasn't working."
Following the game, Boychuk's teammate Anders Lee spoke about the incident and how frightening it truly was.
"Your heart kind of stops," he said.
"It's a dangerous game at times. Your mind is on him the rest of that night. It was great to hear after the game that he was doing better and it's not nearly as serious as it looked. Regardless it's a scary situation."
from WWOS http://wwos.nine.com.au/news/nhl-star-johnny-boychuk-left-needing-90-stitches-after-errant-skate-blade/2af99ad2-0fc7-4594-9e3d-5702fceb044c
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