Victims of a seven-game losing streak, tension and frustration boiled over at the Vancouver Canucks' practice on Thursday.
Veteran defeceman Willie Mitchell and rookie forward Mason Raymond got into an altercation when the two jousted in front of the net. According to the Vancouver Sun, Mitchell punched Raymond in the head and cross-checked him hard on the shoulder.
NHL tough guy Shane O'Brien skated to Raymond's defence and challenged Mitchell to fight before tempers calmed.
''We're doing a lot of good things but we need to crank it up so sometimes there's a little spillover there,'' Mitchell said. ''We need to be practising the way we want to compete in a game.''
O'Brien said hits in practice don't matter.
''It matters when we're playing other teams,'' he said. ''We can hit each other all we want but we have to be a better hockey team.''
The Canucks were booed off the ice Wednesday night after a 5-3 loss to the Nashville Predators, a club-record eighth consecutive home defeat.