There are certain phrases you never want to read in an NHL recap (or your inbox), but I think the one that is most cringeworthy has to be "skate to the face."

Martin St. Louis was going after a loose puck just after a face off, late in the Tampa Bay game at Ottawa on Saturday. The linesman who dropped the puck did a little ill-advised pirouette to get out of the way of the scrum, just as St. Louis went head first into the action. The skate clipped him in the forehead opening up a gash that required eight stitches—although I suppose that's preferable to some of the other possible outcomes, like blindness or decapitation.

Here's a link to another angle in a very large (file size) animated GIF. By the way, it's surprisingly difficult to find footage (or even a picture) of a guy getting his head cut open by a hockey skate. It barely got a mention in the game recap. I don't know what's wrong with this world sometimes.

St. Louis gets a skate to the face [Hockey Herald]
Senators 2, Lightning 0 [NHL.com]