Around the NHL: 8/11/11
It’s time for another ride around the NHL, so buckle in and let’s take a look!
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NHL RDO Camp
The RDO camp is gearing up to start next week, for the second year in a row, and the NHL is taking a look at a few rule changes that they may or may not implement.
Here’s a look at some of the ones that I have strong opinions about one way or the other:
- No-Touch Icing To be fair, I’m not a huge fan of the No-Touch Icing policy, but I would like some sort of hybrid rule employed. A lot of times, the races to the puck are meaningless and, every once in a while you get a knucklehead that doesn’t respect his opponents enough *cough*Matt Cooke*cough* to slow up and not finish his check. It’s a dangerous enough situation when you have two 200-plus men barreling down the ice with blades strapped to their feet without having one of them wanting to send the other into the fifth row. Now, personally, I’m for a variation of the no-touch icing rule which would mean no-touch on the player, meaning, in an icing race, no hits until after a player has possession of the puck.
- No Icing Permitted While Shorthanded This is another rule I like, but in a different iteration. I like teams being able to ice the puck while shorthanded. It relieves pressure in the zone, it allows for line changes and it provides a nice cat-and-mouse game between the team on the power play and the team on the kill. I do think, though, that there is some merit to this rule in an amended form. My idea would be to not allow icing as long as the puck remains in the offensive zone. What this would do would allow the defending team a way to relieve pressure, but also would force them to gain possession of the puck and get the puck out of their own zone before dumping it.
- Extended Overtimes The proposed idea is four minutes of 4-on-4 followed by three minutes of 3-on-3. Now, I don’t like the idea of cutting down players in overtime, but I love the idea of extending it. The idea of extending overtime is born from the fact that people want to minimize the shootout. Now, if we’re going to extend overtime, why not just go all out? Why not just extend it to another full 20-minute period of 5-on-5 hockey? In my opinion, this would be the best way to maximize overtime and minimize the chances of the shootout. Think about it. If you’re playing back-to-back games and are faced with a fourth, full period, you’re going to try as hard as you can to end it as soon as possible, aren’t you? The best thing that the league could do is to give teams incentives not to go to the shootout and, with a five minute overtime, it’s just not cutting it.
Doughty Still not Signed
Well, for everyone that thought that the Shea Weber arbitration hearing would speed up things with Drew Doughty – it’s safe to say that it didn’t.
Doughty and the Kings are still stuck in contract negotiation limbo and it seems that things are getting more and more acrimonious as they continue.
When Dean Lombardi spoke to the press regarding the negotiations, he told Rich Hammond, “I think it’s fair to say that in the last conversation, we set the parameters, as to where we feel his contract should be. We talked about a number of scenarios, and I guess now it’s their move. They never really responded.”
Wow. If that doesn’t sound discouraging, I don’t know what does.
When you looked at the Steven Stamkos situation down in Tampa, it never felt that either side was discouraged about getting a deal done. It never really felt like he would not get signed or miss any time during the season. With Doughty, it’s getting to the point where it doesn’t so much feel like that.
Now, Kings fans should remain calm. He’ll get signed at some point, but the longer this goes on, the more the relationship between Doughty and the Kings is going to deteriorate and the more pressure is going to be put on Doughty to perform and earn his contract, so to speak, once he does get on the ice.
You saw it here in Minnesota with Marian Gaborik where, after his extended hold out, Gaborik didn’t quite live up to expectations and he was, at the end of his stay in Minnesota, vilified by many fans. Now, that’s not to say this is going to happen with Doughty, but it is clear that the longer he goes unsigned and the longer these negotiations go, the more the fans are going to eventually become disenfranchised with their star defenseman.
Unless someone makes an absolutely ridiculous offer sheet offer or an absolutely ridiculous trade offer, Doughty is going to be playing in Los Angeles for years to come. That much is certain. But one of these sides is going to need to blink and, honestly, it may become Doughty’s job as the player to look at his agent and say enough is enough.
The longer these negotiations go on, the more speculation begins to happen and the more that speculation will begin to affect Doughty’s reputation in L.A. with the fans which is exactly what you don’t like to see.
Scoreboard Watching: 3/11/11
Last night was about as bad as it could have gotten for the Wild.
Not only did they play an absolutely horrible game, losing 4-0 to the Nashville Predators, but the team they were chasing, the Phoenix Coytes, won also.
I’ll keep it short and sweet today, so here’s what today’s action looks like.
4) Chicago Blackhawks (37-24-7) – 81 pts – 14 games remaining – Idle
5) Phoenix Coyotes (35-23-11) – 81 pts – 13 games remaining – Idle
6) Calgary Flames (36-25-9) – 81 pts – 12 games remaining – Idle
7) Dallas Stars (36-23-8 ) – 80 pts – 15 games remaining – vs. Minnesota
8 ) Los Angeles Kings (37-25-5) – 79 pts – 15 games remaining – @ Columbus
9) Nashville Predators (34-24-10) – 78 pts – 14 games remaining – Idle
10) Anaheim Ducks (36-26-5) – 77 pts – 15 games remaining – @ Colorado
11) Minnesota Wild (35-26-7) – 77 pts – 14 games remaining – @ Dallas
There you have it. Jose Theodore will be in nets for Minnesota tonight in Dallas, where they haven’t won in this side of forever, in a must win for the Wild. If the Wild lose tonight and Los Angeles and Anaheim both win, we could very easily be looking at the downward spiral of the Wild’s playoff hopes.
Scoreboard Watching: 3/10/11
There’s no use sugar coating it. Last night was a rough night for the Wild’s playoff hopes.
Every single team that was in the Wild’s playoff picture that played got at least one point.
Chicago? Lost to Tampa in the shootout.
Calgary? Beat Dallas in the shootout.
Dallas? Got a loser point.
Los Angeles? Beat the Red Wings.
Anaheim? Beat the Rangers.
The good news is, though, that the Wild have the chance to make up some ground on someone tonight against Nashville. Let’s take a look, shall we?
4) Chicago Blackhawks (37-24-7) – 81 pts – 14 games remaining – Idle
5) Calgary Flames (36-24-9) – 81 pts – 13 games remaining – @ Phoenix Coyotes
6) Dallas Stars (36-23-8 ) – 80 pts – 15 games remaining – Idle
7) Los Angeles Kings (37-25-5) – 79 pts – 15 games remaining – Idle
8 ) Phoenix Coyotes (34-23-11) – 79 pts – 14 games remaining – vs. Calgary Flames
9) Minnesota Wild (35-25-7) – 77 pts – 15 games remaining – @ Nashville Predators
10) Anaheim Ducks (36-26-5) – 77 pts – 15 games remaining – Idle
11) Nashville Predators (33-24-10) – 76 pts – 15 games remaining – vs. Minnesota Wild
As you can see, there’s a lot at stake in the two games between the four teams in this playoff picture right now. In my opinion, the best case scenario tonight would be a Minnesota regulation win and a Calgary regulation win.
The Wild need to be in the playoff picture and, to do so, they need to catch Phoenix. It’s a cliché, but the Wild just need to take it one game at a time and worry about catching the team right in front of them.
Right now, according to Hockey Reference’s playoff probability report, 94 points will be the cutoff for the playoffs, so we can assume that, to be safe, the Wild will need 95. That’s 18 points in their next fifteen games. 9 wins. Will it be difficult? Sure. But it’s well within reach.
Like last night, stop back for the updated games. But, enjoy tonight’s action!
Scoreboard Watching: 3/9/11
Welcome to our newest feature on Wild Nation – Scoreboard Watching.
With the Wild in the midst of one of the tightest playoff races we’ve ever seen, we’re going to be keeping track daily of the teams that the Wild are chasing and that are chasing the Wild. Pretty simple, eh?
Let’s get started.
4) Chicago Blackhawks – (37-24-6) – 80 pts – @ Tampa Bay Lightning
| 1 | 2 | 3 | OT |
SO |
F | |
| Blackhawks | 1 | 1 | 1 |
0 |
0 (0-3) | 3 |
| Lightning | 2 | 1 | 0 |
0 |
1 (1-3) | 4 |
Goal Scorers
Chicago: Kane (16:43, 1st), Sharp (9:39, 2nd), Toews (3:30, 3rd)
Tampa Bay: Stamkos (11:07, 1st), St. Louis (19:44, 1st), Purcell (1:20, 2nd), St. Louis (SO)
Goalies
Chicago: Crawford (27-30)
Tampa Bay: Roloson (28-31)
5) Dallas Stars – (36-23-7) – 79 pts – vs. Calgary Flames
| 1 | 2 | 3 | OT |
SO |
F | |
| Flames | 3 | 0 | 0 |
0 |
1 (2-3) | 4 |
| Stars | 1 | 1 | 1 |
0 |
0 (1-3) | 3 |
Goal Scorers
Calgary: Bourque (10:26, 1st), Kostopoulos (11:28, 1st), Babchuk (13:41, 1st), Glencross (SO)
Dallas: Benn (PPG, 18:28, 1st), Ribiero (5:12, 2nd), Vincour (5:39, 3rd)
Goalies
Calgary: Kiprusoff (31-34)
Dallas: Lehtonen (31-34)
6) Phoenix Coyotes – (34-23-11) – 79 pts – Idle
7) Calgary Flames – (35-34-9) – 79 pts – @ Dallas Stars
8 ) Los Angeles Kings – (36-25-5) – 77 pts – @ Detroit Red Wings
| 1 | 2 | 3 | F | |
| Kings | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 |
| Red Wings | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
Goal Scorers
Los Angeles: Kopitar (7:50, 2nd), Brown (14:43, 2nd)
Detroit: Helm (5:57, 1st)
Goalies
Los Angeles: Quick (28-29)
Detroit: Howard (24-26)
9) Minnesota Wild – (35-25-7) – 77 pts – Idle
10) Nashville Predators – (33-24-10) – 76 pts – Idle
11) Anaheim Ducks – (35-26-8) – 75 pts – vs. N.Y. Rangers
| 1 |
2 |
3 | F | |
| Rangers | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Ducks | 3 | 0 | 2 | 5 |
Goal Scorers
New York: Dubinsky (3:30, 1st), Gaborik (PPG, 5:31, 3rd)
Anaheim: Perry (7:34, 1st), Visnovsky (9:19, 1st), Visnovsky (19:19, 1st), Ryan (2:19, 3rd), Perry (14:36, 3rd)
Goalies
New York: Lundqvist (28-33)
Anaheim: Ellis (30-32)
That’s what we have going on tonight. Check back occasionally throughout the night for your one-shop stop for the Wild’s playoff picture tonight, complete with a box score and how the outcome of the game affects the Wild.
Injury-Riddled Wild Can’t Solve Kings
Well, this is becoming quite the theme. The Wild played hard, but they just didn’t have the offense to get it done.
I’m going to keep this brief, because I’m working on our trade deadline primer that should be up sometime this evening or tomorrow morning, but this was a game that the effort was there for the Wild, but you can’t honestly say that they deserved better.
The Kings wanted it more. Plain and simple.
They forechecked harder, they played smarter, they simply did everything better than Minnesota, right down to hitting the net when they had the opportunity.
Last night, the Wild’s offense was downright putrid at times. They couldn’t get anything going and a large part of that was due to our line combinations.
Before I start on this, I’m not blaming Todd Richards in any way, shape or form for this (a shocker, I know). Quite simply, the discombobulated lines were not his fault. It’s the fact that our top two centers are out right now. The distinct lack of chemistry between Matt Cullen and Andrew Brunette and Antti Miettinen was painfully apparent last night, with that line getting a grand total of four shots on goal. That’s half of what Martin Havlat had on his own.
Meanwhile, John Madden fit in well with Havlat and Pierre-Marc Bouchard, but it was painfully obvious that he was not comfortable playing in an offensive capacity as opposed to a shut down role. Madden was, in a lot of cases, either out of position for what Havlat and Bouchard were doing or simply not expecting it. He battled, he fought hard, but he just wasn’t able to keep up offensively with either of Havlat or Bouchard and the line struggled for it.
It’s a distinct problem when the players through the first half of the game that were most noticeable offensively were Eric Nystrom and Cody Almond, but that was the case for most of the first thirty minutes.
That’s not a recipe for success and that, again, shows that we need to find some sort of depth at the center position.
The good news is that Brodziak will likely be back in the line up on Monday against the ‘Hawks. The bad news, though, is that the team is going to have to do without him for tonight’s game against Anaheim, so expect a type of game similar to what we saw last night.
But that’s enough of the negatives. Let’s look at some of the positives quickly.
Niklas Backstrom, again, was great. Despite giving up three goals, he kept the Wild in the game with some big saves and, were their offense clicking, could have gotten a win or at least a point out of the game.
Brent Burns was great last night, playing physical and he was in on the rush as much as any forward was. For a team that’s struggling offensively, the Wild need Burnsie to step up into the play as much as he can and it looks like that’s exactly what he’s being told by the coaching staff. If he can keep providing some offense from the blue line, it’s going to lighten the load for our beleaguered forward unit right now.
Nystrom also continues to be really good for the Wild. He seems to be playing with more confidence now that he’s finally broken through in the goal column and it’s showing in his game. He’s creating offensive chances now on the team’s checking line.
What else?
The Wild are now sixth in the West, dropping a spot behind L.A. after the loss, and are tied with four other teams at 70 points, and I wouldn’t look at that logjam being alleviated any time soon. This is going to be a race to the playoffs that takes years off of a coach’s life. It’s been hard for any team to gain any sort of separation over the other and it’s going to continue to be hard.
For example, tonight both Calgary and Minnesota are in action. L.A. moved up to sole ownership of fifth with 72 points, but if Calgary and Minnesota both win, there could be a three-way tie with 72 points and a three-way tie with 70 points. Conversely, if both teams lose, there will be six teams tied at 70 points.
The league wanted parity, and this is parity at its best.
There won’t be any gameday preview today, but the puck drops tonight at 9 p.m. and will be on Fox Sports North.
Enjoy your Friday and, if anything happens before tonight’s game we’ll be sure to let you know!
Gameday Thread – Game 61 – Wild @ Kings
I think we’ve finally established that this team is for real. You don’t get to fifth in the playoff race, regardless of how tight that race is, without being for real.
So here’s the catch, though. The Wild now have three games coming up, including back-to-back games tonight and tomorrow, all against teams within two points of them in the standings.
Oh yeah, and they won’t have Mikko Koivu or Kyle Brodziak for at least tonight’s game.
Tonight, the Wild take on the Los Angeles Kings, tomorrow they take on the Anaheim Ducks, then Monday they’re back home for the Chicago Blackhawks.
All within two points of them in the standings.
Suffice it to say that these next three games are big. Like, King Kong big.
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Persevere
The key to tonight’s game for the Wild is going to be perseverance. They’re down two centers, missing Kyle Brodziak and Mikko Koivu for tonight’s game. That’s two of their key penalty killers, two of their key offensive cogs and two of their key face off men.
John Madden and Matt Cullen? Prepare to get a lot of work in tonight.
Cody Almond and Jed Ortmeyer? Prepare to get a lot more work than you thought.
Basically, the Wild just have to make it through. They have to just keep on keeping on right now, because their little mini-road swing just got a heck of a lot harder.
This is a Wild team whose confidence is sky high right now and why shouldn’t it be? They’re 5-2-1 over their last eight games. They have a goaltender who is on top of his game and they’re playing some of the best hockey we’ve seen them play in quite a while.
But this latest problem is proof that something needs to give.
Lack of Depth
Brodziak’s absence has highlighted just how paper thin this roster is right now, especially up the middle.
While some teams are able to cope without their two of their top centermen, the Wild simply don’t have the organizational depth right now to do so. For all intents and purposes right now, Ortmeyer is a body. He’s a body with NHL experience, yes, but there’s no one in their right mind who thinks that he’s going to be able to replace what Brodziak brought to the table – especially over the last handful of games.
Tighten Up
So the Wild are going to need to tighten up.
It’s a tired adage of how you play a road game, but it’s effective nonetheless.
Minnesota cannot get into a track meet today. They can’t hope to have their offense beat the Kings – at least not in a wide-open, high scoring game.
Instead, they need to dig in, lock up that neutral zone and wait for their opportunity to strike. In other words, they need to ask themselves “What Would Jacques Do?”
That’s going to be the key to their success tonight. The Kings have too many offensive weapons for the Wild to go blow-for-blow with them and come out smelling like roses. The Wild, instead, needs to get down and dirty. They need to grind and grind and grind some more until the cracks in the Kings’ armor begins to show.
Then they counter-attack and capitalize on the Kings’ mistakes.
This is a difficult game, yes. But it’s also winnable if the Wild play a smart road game.
The puck drops tonight at 9:30 p.m. and is televised on Fox Sports North.
Wild Down L.A. 1-0 in Shootout
Wow. What a game.
First and foremost, how great was Backstrom tonight? He literally saved the game at least five times that I counted, and that wasn’t counting his absolutely astounding skate save on Jack Johnson in the shootout. He stole this one from the Kings, tonight, and deserves every bit of praise he gets for this shutout.
The Wild, in this one, were good but not great. They played good enough not to lose the game, but didn’t play good enough to win (hence the shootout win). They came out of the gates looking pretty flat, but rebounded towards the end of the first period and kept the surge going for the rest of the game and, all things told, played what was one of their most consistent games of the season – they just didn’t have “the let down.”
It genuinely looked like the break did them good.
Here are some of my thoughts on the game:
- I really can’t say enough about Backs. He looked truly amazing tonight – much like his Vezina-finalist self. If the Wild are going to get into the playoffs, it’s going to be in large part due to the play of their goaltenders and tonight was a very good start.
- Andrew Brunette played in his 1,000th career game and, if you didn’t know it by the time the game was over you weren’t paying attention. I think it was mentioned at least five times by the end of the first period. All kidding aside, though, congratulations to Bruno on a great career so far.
- There’s no way the Wild win this game without their defense. The Kings were credited with 27 shots on goal, they missed the net 16 times and had 25 attempts blocked. Twenty-five. To give you an idea of the magnitude of that, that’s 68 shots that the Kings fired towards the net. Even if they just hit the net on the 16 shots they missed with, this is an entirely different game.
- Martin Havlat’s average shift time was 1:01. Now, I’m going to chalk that up to power play time and his enormously long shift in overtime, but still – 1:01? That’s a good nine seconds longer than the closest player on the Wild and seven seconds longer than the closest player in the game. Seriously, Marty. Shorten your shifts!
- The eight minutes in penalty minutes of this game hid just how physical the game actually was. There were some good, clean hits being thrown around. Besides, it was a welcome change to the march to the box that had been typical for the Wild lately.
- With the way he’s been playing, it’s only a matter of time before Jared Spurgeon gets himself a goal. He looked great once again tonight and his play as well as the strong play of Clayton Stoner and Marco Scandella are making the Wild’s blue line awfully crowded in a hurry and might be making some players on the blue line expendable.
- I’m really impressed with the way that Pierre-Marc Bouchard has been handling things since his return. He’s being slotted in on just about every line but the top one in order to get him ice time and he’s not only not complaining, but filling in every single role that could be asked of him. He’s still working his way back from his horrible concussion, but every game that passes you can see that he’s slowly getting more and more comfortable on the ice and he’s slowly starting to return to his old self.
- The one complaint I have about this game tonight is that the Wild were absolutely putrid in the faceoff circle. Just 35 percent of the draws went the Wild’s way. That’s terrible and that has to be better if the Wild are going to be a contender this season.
Gameday Thread: Game 50 – Kings @ Wild
I hope everyone had a fun All-Star Break, but its back to the daily grind of the NHL as the Wild will be in action tonight against the Los Angeles Kings.
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Russo Game Preview
Russo Morning Skate
NHL.com Preview
LA Kings Insider Preview
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Well, the NHL is back at it tonight and two of the hotter teams before the break will be facing off in the Minnesota Wild and the Los Angeles Kings. The Wild went into the break coming off of a 3-1-0 road trip, while the Kings went into the break winners of three straight.
The biggest thing for Minnesota is going to be maintaining that momentum that they had gained going into the break. They were winners of four out of five games and had outscored their opponents 21-7 during that time. They’ve got to remember that feeling tonight against a Los Angeles team that they have struggled against in the past.
The key stat is that the Wild have got to score first. The team is 21-2-4 when they do as opposed to 4-17-1 when their opponents get on the board first. That tells you both how important confidence is to this team, as well as how fragile their team psyche is. On the other side of the ice, Los Angeles isn’t much better at 6-14-1 when their opponent scores first. That should tell you all you need to know about how important the first goal of this game is.
With how tight the standings are, this is a huge game for both teams, who are tenth and eleventh in the standings (Minnesota is tenth, L.A. is eleventh), both one point out of the seventh spot.
While the top of the Western Conference has managed to distance itself from the pack slightly (the Wild are still just five points out of fourth place, despite being in tenth), just two points separates seventh from twelfth. In other words, missteps cannot happen. The Wild cannot afford to lose their intensity for even a moment; otherwise they could be back down at the bottom of the pile.
The thread is open for your thoughts on this game, so let’s hear them hockey fans.
In net for Minnesota will be Niklas Backstrom and Jonathan Bernier gets the nod for the Kings. The puck drops at 7 p.m. CST and will be on Fox Sports North.
Gameday Thread – Game 8 – Kings @ Wild
Well, there’s not going to be any preview today, but never fret…It’s because, we’re live blogging it tonight!
Join myself, JP Hoornstra and, for a little while anyway, Justin Bourne as we do a live blog of the Wild/Kings game on Versus.
Referees Becoming Focal Point of Playoffs
Okay, Canuck fans.
Take a deep breath and settle in, because you’re going to have a bumpy ride until Game Four.
Last night, in Los Angeles, the NHL blew a call—plain and simple.
Allow me to set the scene.
With the Canucks down by two in the third period, the team was pressuring the Kings and their line of Sedin, Sedin and Burrows was showing life for the first time all game long.
Alex Burrows drove around the outside of the net and attempted to jam home the wrap around. The puck slid off of his stick and off of the skate of Daniel Sedin, between Jonathan Quick’s pads and into the net.
A clear goal.
What was not so clear, initially, was how the puck was directed into the net.
Rule 78.5 (ii) of the NHL rule book clearly states the following:
“Apparent goals shall be disallowed by the Referee and the appropriate announcement made by the Public Address Announcer for the following reasons:
…
(ii) When the puck has been kicked using a distinct kicking motion.”
Now I am admittedly biased against the Canucks. I’m a Wild fan. I just don’t like ‘em.
But that, last night, was a goal.
Even Mike Murphy’s comments on CBC seem to scream that Toronto made a mistake that they didn’t want to own up to:
“It had to be propelled in some way. Not with a distinct kicking motion, but with a kicking motion, that made it move back the other way. It wasn’t a deflection. It wasn’t a redirect. It was a kick. That’s the decision we came up with.”
What’s interesting about this statement is that Murphy single handedly re-writes the NHL rule book in one statement.
It wasn’t a distinct kicking motion. Just a kicking motion, which surely had nothing to do with Sedin trying to stop before plowing through Quick, or trying to keep the defensemen behind him out of position to clear away a possible rebound attempt.
Furthermore, what really bothers me about this call is that it was a good goal on the ice, which means that there had to be conclusive evidence in order to overturn the call on the ice and I, for the life of me, can’t find a single thing conclusive about any angle of any of the replays that I saw.
So Canucks fans, you are justified in crying foul. It was a bad call at the worst of times. It was a call that changed the complexion of the game.
But it speaks to a larger problem in these playoffs.
No, it’s not some grand conspiracy to ensure that the Kings win the Stanley Cup.
{Author’s Note: Puck Daddy already addressed this issue quite well, with all of the rationale I would have used, so I won’t beat a dead horse here—but, in any event, go check his out because 1) he’s right on the money and 2) he’s right on the money.}
What this speaks to is that the level of officiating in these playoffs has been much, much lower than what you would like to see when every mistake in every game is amplified tenfold (just ask Dan Boyle).
The playoffs are still young, but the blown call last night was the third egregious blown call that I had witnessed in the last three days of playoff hockey and the second that completely shot any momentum gained in the foot.
Take the game between Washington and Montreal on Saturday, for example.
The Capitals are down 4-2 and pressuring Montreal hard. I believe it was Tom Poti who pinched in deep before deciding to take a shortcut, following the puck into the crease. Poti collided with Jaroslav Halak with little to no effort exerted trying to avoid him.
No call.
The ensuing scramble for the loose puck that was in the crease saw a Montreal player make a hand pass with no Caps player near the puck…
Resulting in a whistle?
While the goalie interference call might have been debatable, there’s no doubt that the hand pass wasn’t. There was no Caps player even attempting to reach down and swipe at the puck with his hand and the puck was lying directly between two Habs players.
Look. I get it.
Referees are human. They miss calls. They make mistakes.
But in the playoffs the stakes are higher and the players raise their games to the next level.
Quite frankly, I think it’s time that the refs do the same.
No one knows what the outcome of Vancouver’s game would have been had the goal been allowed.
It could have just been 5-4, or it could have sparked a Vancouver rally. We simply don’t know.
But what this shoddy refereeing is doing is placing the spotlight on the referees, not on the players where it should be, and that is a large problem.
