After tallying 18 goals in the first 52 games of the 2023-24 campaign, Anthony Mantha is on pace to score a career-high 26 goals. The Longueuil, Quebec native’s bounce-back season comes after being healthy-scratched by former Capitals head coach Peter Laviolette and put on the trade block by general manager Brian MacLellan.
But Mantha did the work behind the scenes to re-find his confidence. He hired a mental coach and lost nearly 10 pounds over the offseason to gain speed. The results have been noticeable.
Now Mantha is getting attention across the NHL, but not for his highlights on offense this season. It’s for an angry fight he had with Florida Panthers forward Nick Cousins on Saturday night.
With 9:22 remaining in the second period, Mantha hooked Cousins and cross-checked him into the boards after a scoring chance. Cousins responded by slashing Mantha across the arms. Mantha gave him return fire in the form of a cross-check to the face/neck area. The two then immediately dropped the gloves.
Mantha connected on a huge overhand right and uppercut, forcing Cousins to turtle and fall to the ice. Mantha was likely looking to exact revenge after a number of pest-y plays Cousins authored earlier in the game, including a hit on Max Pacioretty at the bench.
“Do you know Anthony Mantha’s address and what are his favorite flowers?” one popular hockey media personality texted me after the game.
Mantha’s fight is also going viral on social media.
On Hockey Reddit, a post titled After years of cheap shots, Nick Cousins finally gets punched has 6.4k likes.
“All my homies hate cousins,” one commenter wrote.
“Interestingly all my cousins hate him,” responded another.
There was also particular admiration in the thread for Mantha taking a punch to the face to rip Cousins’ helmet off his head so that he couldn’t avoid retribution.
Meanwhile, a photo taken by JC Ruiz of the fight has received nearly 30k views on Twitter. “I had front row seats,” he said in the caption. The photo features Mantha striking Cousins in the mouth, forcing his eyes closed. Ruiz also posted a series of shots from the intense fight.
Across the NHL, Cousins has drawn the ire of opposing players for how he plays the game. In a player poll conducted by The Athletic earlier this season, Cousins finished first and got 28.6 percent of the vote for the question Who’s the player in the league whose face you most want to punch? Tom Wilson, for the record, finished 13th as one anonymous player said, “He’s not a rat. I respect that. But I’d still like to punch him.”
Cousins has garnered a reputation for being a dirty player that will go to extreme lengths to avoid retribution.
“The fact of the matter is people come to games and watch on TV in the hopes to see a Michigan goal and the hopes of seeing a fight. They like it,” Sportsnet’s Kevin Bieksa said earlier in the season setting up a highlight package. “What people don’t want to watch and see is kneeing, hitting a guy’s head into the boards, ramming a guy from behind, and that’s a common theme for [Nick Cousins]… This is a trend with this player. He’s done this a numerous amount of times ramming a guy’s head into the boards, the hit earlier in the year on Gudbranson, this is the hit on Scheifele from last year. There’s no place in the game for this. And what’s the common thread in all of these? Him at the bottom of the pile in a turtle position.”
Cousins’ most recent controversial play came when he hit Coyotes defenseman Juuso Välimäki, who was on his knees, head first into the glass. Coyotes forward Jason Zucker responded by boarding Cousins. Zucker was suspended three games for his actions. Cousins got no supplemental discipline.
Earlier in the year, he checked Erik Gudbranson face-first into the boards and the Blue Jackets defenseman was ejected after he went after him.
While Mantha’s fight was notable, it may have come at a price. The Capitals’ forward suffered an injury at some point during the evening and could not finish the game.
