Tampa Bay Lightning's Conor Geekie officially suspended by the NHLPA

The NHL's 2024 pre-season certainly hasn't lacked the fire that we see in regular season games constantly, and while that's resulted in some injuries, it's resulted in some very fun moments as well. One of those came on Wednesday during the Battle of Florida between the Panthers and Lightning, as winger Josh Davies took a run at Lightning captain Victor Hedman, taking him down with a beautiful hit.

However, Nikita Kucherov and young center Conor Geekie seemingly took exception to the play, and after Kucherov got physical with Davies, it was the 20-year old Geekie that stepped up and dropped the gloves.

On first glance, this was all clean and nothing that a penalty wouldn't suffice, but upon further inspection, he needed to front the NHL's Department of Player Safety for a clear violation of rule 70.2;

Ultimately, once Geekie faced the NHL's DPoS, it was clear that a suspension was coming, and now the official announcement has been made that he will miss one pre-season games for his actions.

If Geekie had of made an illegal line change to instigate an altercation, it would have carried with it an automatic suspension of 10 games, but because of that, he gets off very light with just one game, a punishment that certainly fits the crime. At 20-years old, Geekie has a very bright future in the NHL, and while his spot on this team isn't guaranteed with the regular season drawing near, he has a great chance to make the lineup, so keep an eye on a very exciting young prospect moving forward.