MONTREAL - Showing the appetite for details of Tiger Woods' meltdown knows no bounds, former NHL coach Pat Burns has offered his take on the night the world's best golfer crashed his SUV just outside his Florida home.
During his daily interview with CKAC Sports radio in Montreal on Tuesday, Burns says he was told by police acquaintances in Florida that Woods' wife Elin Nordegren hit her husband with a golf club -- leaving Woods with a deep cut on the cheek and two missing front teeth -- after reading texts from another woman on his cellphone.
Burns said it was at that point that Woods fled for his car, with his wife in pursuit.
Burns, a former police officer and hockey coach who lives in Florida, says sources he's close to within the Florida Highway Patrol gave him an account of what they said transpired during the U.S. Thanksgiving weekend.
Neither Woods nor Nordegren has spoken publicly about what happened that night.
But the unsubstantiated story of the missing teeth and golf club has made the rounds on the Internet, including in a blog by a longtime Atlanta Journal-Constitution columnist, who cited another reporter close to Woods.
Burns says Nordegren smashed the windows of his SUV shortly before he crashed the vehicle into a tree in the upscale central Florida neighbourhood where they lived.
Burns said Woods was not immediately available to the police following the incident because he was in Phoenix having emergency dental and plastic surgery.
The Florida Highway Patrol, however, has said Woods had a fat lip" but no other visible facial injuries when he met with officers four days after the car accident.
Patrol spokeswoman Kim Montes said officers wanted to see if Woods had any injuries that were inconsistent with a car accident. She said troopers found no reason to believe Woods was a victim of domestic violence.
Woods has not been seen in public since the crash, but more than a dozen women have come forward claiming they've had affairs with the famous athlete.
Burns, a former head coach of the Montreal Canadiens, Toronto Maple Leafs, Boston Bruins and New Jersey Devils, was also a former police officer in Gatineau, Que.
