Boston Bruins defenseman Charlie McAvoy could be facing a lengthy suspension to start the 2026-27 season after the NHL announced Saturday it has offered an in-person hearing with its Department of Player Safety to the 28-year-old.

The date of the hearing is still to be determined. Any discipline would be served next season due to Boston’s season being over.

McAvoy received a major penalty for slashing and a game misconduct in Boston’s 4-1 loss to the Buffalo Sabres in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference first-round. That setback on Friday eliminated the Bruins from the postseason.

The incident with 1:31 left in the third period occurred after Buffalo’s Zach Benson tripped McAvoy as the two chased after a loose puck. McAvoy got up and charged toward Benson and swung his stick like a baseball bat at Benson.

After the game, McAvoy wasn’t concerned about a possible suspension.

“I don’t play another game until September,” McAvoy said. “Can’t imagine it really matters much.”

If a suspension might be six games or longer, the NHL offers the player an in-person meeting. The player can decline the in-person methods and conduct it by phone. Suspension of five games or less are typically handled via phone.

McAvoy scored a career-high 61 points and had 11 goals in 69 games this season. He had two assists in the series against Buffalo.

Overall, McAvoy has 71 goals and 361 points in 573 games over nine seasons with the Bruins. He has six goals and 50 points in 97 career playoff games.

McAvoy was a member of Team USA as it won the gold medal at the Winter Olympics earlier this year. It was the USA’s first men’s Olympic gold since the historic performance at Lake Placid in 1980.

–Field Level Media

Light-hitting backup catcher Austin Hedges smacked two doubles and his first homer of the year to pace the visiting Cleveland Guardians to a 14-6 victory over the Athletics on Saturday afternoon in West Sacramento, Calif.

David Fry and Kyle Manzardo also went deep for the Guardians, who bashed 14 hits to set up a chance for the three-game sweep on Sunday. Starter Slade Cecconi (1-4) allowed five runs in 5 1/3 innings.

Shea Langeliers had a banner day for the A’s, hitting his team-high ninth and 10th home runs of the season. Starter Jacob Lopez (2-2) gave up six runs and eight hits over 5 1/3 innings.

The Athletics took a 2-0 lead on the first of Langeliers’ long balls, a two-run shot off Cecconi in the first.

Hedges responded with a solo shot in the third before the Athletics answered with a run in the fourth on a Jeff McNeil RBI single.

Hedges started the Guardians’ four-run rally in the fifth with a double. He scored on Steven Kwan’s bloop single, Angel Martinez followed with another single and then Jose Ramirez’s double scored Kwan and Martinez to give Cleveland its first lead. Rhys Hoskins’ sacrifice fly pushed the score to 5-3.

After Langeliers and Fry traded solo shots, McNeil got his second RBI of the game with a sac fly in the sixth and the A’s threatened to tie or take the lead with runners on the corners. Hedges came up with the defensive play of the game to end the inning, a perfectly executed back-pick of Lawrence Butler at first base.

Cleveland poured it on in the later innings. In the seventh, Fry drew a bases-loaded walk and Travis Bazzana knocked in two with a single up the middle. It was the perfect time for Bazzana’s first major league hit after he was 0-for-12 at the plate to begin his career.

Manzardo added on with a pinch-hit three-run homer in the eighth. Colin Holderman gave up an RBI single to Nick Kurtz in the bottom of the inning, but he forced Langeliers to pop out to leave the bases loaded.

Cleveland plated two more in the ninth to complete the blowout win.

Kurtz went 2-for-5, but failed to walk to end his streak of 20 games with at least one free pass. That shares second on the all-time list with Barry Bonds (2002-03). The Detroit Tigers’ Roy Cullenbine set the record with 22 straight games in 1947.

–Field Level Media

Jonathan Aranda went 2-for-4 with two RBIs as the Tampa Bay Rays clinched their first series win against a National League club, prevailing 5-1 over the San Francisco Giants on Saturday night in St. Petersburg, Fla.

The Rays had lost a single three-game series against all five NL Central teams in March and April before claiming the first two games against the Giants, who lost their fifth straight.

Griffin Jax made his second start and pitched 2 2/3 scoreless innings with one hit, one walk and two strikeouts.

Jesse Scholtens (3-1) followed and allowed one run on four hits in three innings. He fanned three without a walk.

San Francisco’s Luis Arraez went 3-for-4 with a double and a run, accounting for nearly half of the team’s seven hits.

San Francisco right-hander Landen Roupp (5-2) surrendered four runs and eight hits in 4 1/3 innings. He struck out six and walked two.

In the second inning, Heliot Ramos hit a drive that Rays center fielder Cedric Mullins went to the 404-foot mark at the wall to catch. However, Mullins rushed in and caught it at the beginning of the warning track.

An umpire-initiated review of the shot – estimated at 424 feet – resulted in the out call standing instead of it being deemed to have hit a wire or ring in the dome, which would have made it a home run.

Giants pitcher Adrian Houser and director of major league pitching Frank Anderson were then ejected by home plate umpire Hunter Wendelstedt.

Roupp, who had allowed just one run in 18 innings in three road starts, was sharp until the fourth when the Rays scored two batters after Junior Caminero’s groundout was challenged and overturned to an infield single. He eventually scored on Jake Fraley’s single.

Hunter Feduccia’s double, Taylor Walls’ walk and Chandler Simpson’s bunt single loaded the bases with no outs in the fifth, and Mullins plated one with a walk before Aranda chased Roupp with a two-run single to center for a 4-0 lead.

Rafael Devers broke up the shutout with a double in the sixth to plate Arraez, who also doubled.

Jonny DeLuca, who was 2-for-4 with a double, swiped third and scored on a throwing error by catcher Patrick Bailey in the eighth for the final margin.

–Field Level Media