{"id":502278,"date":"2026-03-14T02:24:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T02:24:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/502278\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T02:24:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T02:24:13","slug":"radko-gudas-suspended-5-games-for-his-knee-on-knee-hit-that-injured-auston-matthews-sports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/502278\/","title":{"rendered":"Radko Gudas suspended 5 games for his knee-on-knee hit that injured Auston Matthews | Sports"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Anaheim Ducks defenseman Radko Gudas has been suspended five games for his knee-on-knee hit that injured Toronto Maple Leafs captain Auston Matthews and sidelined him<\/a> for the rest of the season.<\/p>\n

The NHL\u2019s Department of Player Safety announced the suspension after a phone hearing with Gudas earlier Friday. Because it was a conference call and not \u201cin-person\u201d \u2014 now on Zoom \u2014 the ban was limited to a maximum of five games.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s Gudas\u2019 fifth suspension in 14 seasons in the league and his first since 2019. He forfeits $104,167 in salary and will miss games against Ottawa, Montreal, Philadelphia, Utah and Buffalo.<\/p>\n

The 35-year-old Czech is eligible to return March 24 at Vancouver. In first place in the Pacific Division with 17 games left, the Ducks are attempting to end a seven-year playoff drought dating to their most recent appearance in 2018.<\/p>\n

Toronto a little over an hour before the length of Gudas’ suspension was unveiled said Matthews had a torn medial collateral ligament and a bruised quadriceps muscle.<\/p>\n

Matthews’ agent, Judd Moldaver, said in a statement he was very disappointed and shocked about the ruling, given the severity of the play.<\/p>\n

\u201cA phone hearing and five games is just laughable and preposterous,\u201d said Moldaver, who is the executive VP at THE.TEAM agency. \u201cThat there was no further discipline is a reckless and ridiculous position for player safety. This decision results in a further loss of confidence in the disciplinary process for all players. Players and fans deserve better. The player safety department should be suspended.\u201d<\/p>\n

Player safety recently also opted for a phone hearing with Pittsburgh’s Evgeni Malkin for slashing Buffalo’s Rasmus Dahlin. Malkin also was suspended five games<\/a> for swinging his stick at Dahlin.<\/p>\n

With just over four minutes left in the second period of the teams’ game<\/a> Thursday night, Gudas’ left knee made contact with Matthews’ left knee and sent the 28-year-old American star to the ice in pain.<\/p>\n

Gudas was given a 5-minute major penalty and ejected. Matthews needed assistance from an athletic trainer and a teammate to leave the rink, and he did not return.<\/p>\n

Toronto coach Craig Berube called it a dirty play, and forward Matthew Knies said Gudas has \u201cdone a few of those before in his career.\u201d Anaheim coach Joel Quenneville defended Gudas, saying there was no premeditation and that it was the result of reflexes.<\/p>\n

Gudas, a bruising defender who is 6-foot and 208 pounds, was also involved in the play that knocked Canada’s Sidney Crosby out<\/a> of the Olympics, while representing Czechia. He was not penalized, and opponents did not publicly take issue with Gudas’ role in that situation.<\/p>\n

Although he was not considered a repeat offender under the terms of the collective bargaining agreement, which counts supplemental discipline over the past two years, Gudas has a long rap sheet from earlier in his career. He was suspended four times between 2015-19: three games for an illegal check to the head, six for interference, 10 for slashing and two for high-sticking.<\/p>\n

Adding this time, Gudas has been suspended for 26 games and docked $855,527 in salary.<\/p>\n

Matthews last month captained the U.S.<\/a> to its first men’s hockey gold medal at the Olympics since 1980. From Arizona, he’s in his 10th season in the league and leads the Maple Leafs in goals with 27.<\/p>\n

AP NHL: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/nhl<\/a><\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 Anaheim Ducks defenseman Radko Gudas has been suspended five games for his knee-on-knee hit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502279,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[2210,233,5292,911,1739,5,4,292,59145,43,2583],"class_list":{"0":"post-502278","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-anaheim-ducks","8":"tag-anaheim","9":"tag-anaheim-ducks","10":"tag-anaheimducks","11":"tag-athlete-injuries","12":"tag-ducks","13":"tag-hockey","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-nhl-hockey","16":"tag-radko-gudas-suspension-matthews","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-sports-transactions"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116225157533535225","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=502278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}