Gallant and Viel deliver the best hockey fight in years.
Jeffrey Viel and Alex Gallant throw defense out the window and try to take one another's heads off.
This was just a good old fashion hockey fight.
On Friday night, Jeffrey Viel and Alex Gallant delivered what may very well have been the best hockey fight I've seen in the last few years, one that long time hockey fans will recognize as just a good old fashion hockey tilt. It was very reminiscent of the kind of fights we would see in the National Hockey League from years gone by, except this one was contested in the American Hockey League.
Neither the 30 year old Gallant, a forward for the Calgary Wranglers, and the 26 year old Viel, a forward for the Manitoba Moose, appeared to show any concern for their own well being as both men threw the idea of defense right out the window. Instead the two warriors simply squared off with one another and threw some vicious looking haymakers at one another as they tried to take their opponent's head off.
Some more safety minded hockey fans may be questioning why the officials on the ice didn't step in to separate these men sooner than they did, but quite frankly with the level of intensity involved in this exchange I can hardly blame the linesmen for staying out of harm's way.
The end result of this exchange was one hell of a show for the fans in attendance and no doubt a new found measure of respect for both men who left it all out on the ice on Friday night. You can see the full replay of the exchange between Jeffrey Viel and Alex Gallant in the short clip, courtesy of the Calgary Wranglers, just below.