This could not have been an easy decision for Colin Campbell. AP

The National Hockey League finally got it right.

With a chance to hedge and fudge, NHL executive vice-president and director of hockey operations Colin Campbell (and no doubt commissioner Gary Bettman) made the right call in suspending Vancouver Canucks right wing Todd Bertuzzi for the remainder of the season and the playoffs.

As the hockey world held its breath, and perhaps while Campbell, an old-time hockey guy, held his nose, the league handed down the most significant suspension since former president Clarence Campbell suspended Maurice Richard for the 1955 playoffs. The Richard decision touched off a riot in Montreal. The Bertuzzi decision will not send Vancouverites pouring into the streets, although it should inspire gratitude from fans who want hockey's ethos of frontier justice toned down to civilized levels.

Unlike the paint-by-numbers decision on Marty McSorley four years ago, Bertuzzi, who assaulted Colorado's Steve Moore during a game Monday, was a more delicate case. The decision to crack down on Bertuzzi required some fortitude, something that has been only in occasional supply in a league office that loves to rationalize. McSorley, who stalked and then hit Vancouver's Donald Brashear with a stick, was at the end of his career, playing for the no-hope Boston Bruins in 2000. Bertuzzi, on the other hand, is a premier winger on a team that had legitimate Stanley Cup aspirations -- at least until the suspension. Bertuzzi will forfeit his pay for the remainder of the regular season, about $500,000.

That might have been the most expensive punch in history.

The decision followed a whirlwind Wednesday for Bertuzzi, who met with Campbell in Toronto in the morning and returned to Vancouver to read a statement at 7 p.m. PST. The remorse was as apparent as the tears welling in his eyes and the catch in his throat. He dabbed at the eyes several times. He turned his back to the cameras and took a drink. During those riveting, lachrymose few moments, Bertuzzi apologized to Moore, to Moore's family, to his teammates and even to the children who watch hockey. He then added he was not a mean-spirited person, the implication being that he would be the last guy in the world to do something like this.

In fact, Bertuzzi was the last guy in the world do to exactly that. The contrition seemed genuine -- and North America loves apologies almost as much as it loves those dopey reality TV shows -- but there are only so many ways to parse a brutal cheap shot that landed a man in the hospital with fractured vertebrae in his neck and a concussion. "Sorry" is nice, but it does not mend broken bones.

Campbell chose to not to parse the incident with any more nuance than it deserved, not to weigh the relative importance of the playoffs and regular season, not to rationalize and certainly not to condone. Within the hockey culture that would have applauded Bertuzzi for merely beating up Moore in a fight yet looks askance at the hulking Canucks right wing for throwing a sucker punch, Campbell might have been able to get away with suspending Bertuzzi for the regular season and one playoff round. Of course, beyond the NHL cocoon, anything less than a suspension for the remainder of the season -- playoffs included -- would have been inexplicable. Given the suspension, and the fact that Bertuzzi must meet with Bettman before training camp to discuss reinstatement, no explanations are necessary.

To properly police its sport and to perhaps deter any other incidents that reduce the game to a cartoon in the minds of people who have not acquired the hockey gene, the NHL had to go the extra distance in the Bertuzzi case. Campbell sat down a star player without equivocation, engaging in some exemplary justice. He walked to the very precipice, looked down and and did not back off.

The NHL was well served.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Michael Farber covers the NHL for the magazine and is a regular contributor to SI.com.