Jeff Skinner drops the gloves with teammate Dwyer at practice…wait, what?

Don’t let the face fool you – Jeff Skinner isn’t afraid to chuck knuckles. Even, as we learned today, with a Hurricanes teammate.

According to the News & Observer, Skinner and Carolina forward Pat Dwyer dropped the gloves after a particularly intense one-on-one battle drill.

Teammates quickly separated the two (presumably while trying not to laugh), after which Skinner and Dwyer apologized to each other.

“It’s not because I don’t like him,” Skinner said. “Everything’s all right. It’s just a tough drill there at the end. It’s not something you want to do every practice but it happens every once in a while. You don’t look for it but sometimes it happens.

“I maybe could have reacted a little differently but he’s a competitive guy.”

Both Skinner and Dwyer added the obligatory “this just shows we care” comments, and that was that.