Thomas Hickey Penalized for Hitting Tom Wilson Too Hard

"Hey, they can't do that to our pledges. Only WE can do that to our pledges." - NBC SportsOr: Hi, I remember when you threatened Lubo's head all series and then knocked him out.

Sports fans are partisan hypocrites. This we know.

Thus no surprise that when Thomas Hickey checked Tom Wilson hard in the corner and punctuated with a sneak elbow -- though mercifully not charging him with a concussion bomb as the latter did to end Lubomir Visnovsky's career last spring -- that Washington Capitals and New York Islanders fans had the opposite reaction from last spring's incident.

In the parlance of our courageous partisan times, Hickey "stopped his legs but didn't shy away from the hit." Wilson was, in…