Kevin Bieksa fires back at Zdeno Chara for accusing Canucks of premature Stanley Cup celebration in 2011

Kevin Bieksa has taken exception with comments that Boston Bruins legend Zdeno Chara made about the Vancouver Canucks in the 2011 Stanley Cup Final.

In a recent appearance on the “Games with Names” podcast, Chara accused the Canucks of practicing their Stanley Cup celebration on the ice ahead of Game 6 at TD Garden in Boston. Chara admitted the Bruins used that as extra motivation to defend their home ice in Game 6 before winning the Stanley Cup in Vancouver with a 4-0 win in Game 7.

Bieksa, now an analyst for Sportsnet, fired back at Chara on Saturday night. Bieksa said Chara’s story was “one of the dumbest things we’ve ever heard.”

“I don’t think I have to spend a lot of time discrediting that this didn’t happen because, logistically, it’s impossible,” Bieksa said. “You think about all the media that’s there covering the Finals and all the competitiveness of trying to find some story that’s different from the other person’s. Clearly, someone would’ve reported on that or had a camera. Even Chara walked it back in his comments a little bit from ‘we saw them’ to ‘we heard them in the Garden’ to ‘we heard’ to ‘we believe we heard.'”

Bieksa really took exception to the idea that the Canucks’ leadership group, which featured three players now in the Hall of Fame, would have let any kind of premature celebration happen. The former Vancouver defenseman said he was “disappointed” that Chara would tell that story in public without verifying it first.

“Originally, I was upset about it to hear because it’s a bit of an attack on our character as a team and an organization, but also our leadership group,” Bieksa said. “You’re talking about three first-ballot Hall of Famers in (Henrik and Daniel Sedin) and (Roberto) Luongo). You’re talking about (Manny) Malholtra and (Dan) Hamhuis and myself. To think that we would allow something like that to happen, let alone participate in it, is disappointing.

“Coming from a guy like Chara, you would expect more and maybe a little bit more of a mutual respect that he wouldn’t repeat a story like that that is so insulting to us without fact-checking it or witnessing it first hand. The main emotion I have right now is just disappointed in him.”