Newfoundland player suspended after fighting fans who taunted him outside locker room

The brand new Avalon East Senior Hockey League is on PR damage control following an off-ice altercation between one of its star players and some fans in Harbour Grace, Newfoundland and Labrador.

Assistant captain Justin Pender of the Clarenville Ford Caribous has been suspended by the league for allegedly attacking fans outside his team's locker room after being taunted for his game ejection. Pender was clearly hot all game and was ejected with less than 10 minutes left in the game for taking multiple runs at his opponents on the HGOE CeeBee Stars. The Stars were reportedly running up the score on the Caribous and Pender took exception. When he was ejected from the game he was jeered by Caribous fans outside the locker room and that's when things turned violent.

From CBC:

CBC News has obtained a copy of security camera footage, which shows four male fans making their way to the hallway entrance beneath the arena bleachers, where the dressing rooms are located.

One of the fans, John Drover of Bay Roberts, can be seen gesturing at Pender as the player enters the hallway from the ice surface.

Pender stops and throws the broken shaft of his stick at the fans from a distance of nearly 10 metres, and it lands harmlessly at Drover's feet.

Pender then starts walking aggressively toward the fans, fully clad in his hockey gear and already incensed from an earlier outburst on the ice in which he confronted the CeeBees' bench and smashed his stick on the leg of an opposing player as an official was escorting Pender off the ice. Video of that on-ice skirmish has been shared widely on social media.

Meanwhile, a young boy can be seen on the security video entering the hallway entrance, but quickly retreats when he sees Pender — who stands six feet four inches, weighs 215 pounds and has a reputation for playing an edgy, tough style of hockey — storming toward him.

However, Drover stands his ground as Pender reaches the end of the hallway. It's at this point that Pender, wearing his bulky hockey gloves, starts throwing punches at Drover.

Pender's teammate, Thomas Hedges, who was also ejected from the game, can also be seen running down the hallway behind Pender.

Some of the fracas is not captured by the security camera, so it's not clear if Hedges is throwing punches or trying to extricate his teammate from the melee. Caribous' general manager Ivan Hapgood is also seen walking down the hallway and out of the camera frame.

And here's the CCTV footage that CBC references:

Should we really be surprised though?

This sort of stuff has been happening for decades in Senior hockey. Not that that makes it acceptable, but it's not entirely a new development. Add in the fact that Pender has a reputation for being a hot head and this is no surprise to me.

And if Pender's name rings a bell for you like it did for me... well... you may remember him from his infamous appearance on the Spittin' Chiclets' ball hockey team.

Remember this?

So again... are we really surprised?