‘Joke’ and ‘a crime scene’: Hurricanes coach Brind’Amour furious about NHL goal review
Updated with NHL fine, 6:20 pm
Rod Brind’Amour was furious at the time and the Carolina Hurricanes coach was no less furious after the curious NHL review of the Boston Bruins second goal turned out to be a relative nonfactor in the Hurricanes’ 4-3 double overtime loss Wednesday.
Brind’Amour challenged one aspect of the play; the NHL ruled that the officials had actually gotten a different aspect wrong and not only awarded the goal but gave the Bruins a power play.
“This is why the league’s a joke, in my opinion, on these things,” Brind’Amour told The News & Observer. “That one is a crime scene.”
It took the NHL all of three hours to fine Brind’Amour $25,000 for his comments, with the threat of another $25,000 “in the event of similar inappropriate behavior” over the next year.
In the second period, Boston’s Charlie Coyle ended up scoring into an open net after Anders Bjork swiped the puck from Petr Mrazek’s glove on the ice. The Hurricanes challenged the goal, arguing that there was an illegal hand pass when the Bruins’ Nick Ritchie knocked the puck out of midair with his glove before it ended up with Mrazek.
Referee Chris Lee ruled that Mrazek had possession of the puck, wiping out the hand pass -- an admission the officials botched the play by failing to blow the whistle when Mrazek froze the puck -- and awarding the goal. But Brind’Amour said afterward that referees Lee and Francis Charron wouldn’t give him any information about the call on the ice, leaving him with a 50-50 choice of which of their potential mistakes to challenge.
“They came to me, and I said, ‘If he has possession of it then it’s goalie interference. If he doesn’t have possession then it’s a hand pass. It’s one of the two. I don’t know what you’re calling on the ice,’” Brind’Amour said. “All he has to do is tell me. ‘We’re calling it nonpossession (by Mrazek),’ then we’re challenging a glove-hand pass. If it’s possession, then goaltender interference. I said, ‘Tell me the call on the ice.’ They wouldn’t do it when I say, ‘What is the call?’ So I had to flip a coin. ...
“I said, ‘What was the call on the ice?’ and he said, ‘You’ve got to call one or the other.’ It should be so easy. If they said the goalie had it, then it’s an easy call. They wouldn’t tell you. It makes no sense. I know we weren’t the better team, but if that goal doesn’t go in, do we win that game? I don’t know.”
Officially, per the NHL: “Hurricanes goaltender Petr Mrazek controlled the puck prior to Charlie Coyle’s goal, which nullified the potential hand pass.”
Officially, on the NHL’s official interview feed: “That call was ... I mean to get the penalty ... I still can’t figure it out,” Brind’Amour said.
McGinn scored short-handed almost immediately in a classic “puck don’t lie” moment to tie the score 2-2, his first playoff goal since the double-overtime series-winner against the Washington Capitals last spring.
“‘Mraz’ covered the puck, but that’s the breaks that happen in the game of hockey,” McGinn said.
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Unexpected changes
Not everyone made it through the Hurricanes’ week off (and more!) in the NHL’s Toronto bubble. When the time came, belatedly, for Game 1 against the Bruins on Wednesday, Justin Williams and Sami Vatanen were both “unfit to play,” per the NHL’s new injury-disclosure rules.
With only team media allowed to watch practices in the bubble — under normal circumstances, practices and morning skates are open not only to the media but opposing teams if they happen to be in the building — the absence of two key players to start the series came as a surprise since Brind’Amour said earlier in the lengthy break that everyone who played in the qualifying-round sweep of the New York Rangers was still available to play.
The Professional Hockey Writers Association asked the NHL to provide a closed-circuit video feed of practices and morning skates inside the bubble as a concession to current circumstances, but the NHL said it was not logistically possible.
The delay from Tuesday night to Wednesday morning after Tuesday’s five-overtime marathon between the Columbus Blue Jackets and Tampa Bay Lightning did give Hamilton an extra 15 hours of recovery time as he prepared to return after breaking his leg in January and reinjuring himself in practice last month. Hamilton slotted right back into the lineup, replacing Vatanen in his usual spot next to Jaccob Slavin on Carolina’s top pairing and on the top power-play unit. Hamilton was minus-2 in 26:48 of ice time.
Ryan Dzingel, a healthy scratch in all three games of the Rangers series, ended up in Nino Niederreiter’s spot next to Vincent Trocheck and Martin Necas, with Niederreiter demoted to the fourth line with Morgan Geekie and Jordan Martinook. Brock McGinn moved from the fourth line to Williams’ old spot on Jordan Staal’s right wing.
Neither injury is believed to be serious. Vatanen’s unavailability appeared to be late-breaking, since Jake Gardiner was expected to sit Tuesday night to make way for Hamilton.
“They were game-time decisions,” Brind’Amour said. “We adjusted. Like I said, hopefully they’ll be able to go tomorrow.”
Goalie rotation rotates
After James Reimer’s show-stopping performance in Game 3 of the Rangers series, Brind’Amour went back to Mrazek for Game 1 of the first round, the starter for the first two games of the qualifying round. Mrazek stopped 36 of 40 shots but was caught leaning badly in the wrong direction on the game-winner.
Regardless of Wednesday’s result, it will be interesting to see if Brind’Amour follows the same plan as the Rangers series and Reimer gets the call in Game 2 of this unplanned back-to-back. There’s potentially another back-to-back in Games 5 and 6 of this series, if needed.
Extra time
The Hurricanes and Bruins played the sixth and seventh overtime periods on the Scotiabank Arena ice in a 21-hour period. Since moving to North Carolina in 1999, the Hurricanes are 18-9 in playoff overtime games, 3-2 against the Bruins.
Tailwinds
Sebastian Aho extended his point streak to four games on Joel Edmumdson’s opening goal. The Andrei Svechnikov-Aho-Teuvo Teravainen line has 17 points in the playoffs. The rest of the team has 17. … The Hurricanes were outshot 40-28 through the end of the first overtime. In the regular season, the Hurricanes were 19-18-2 when outshooting opposition, 18-7-3 when outshot. They outshot the Rangers twice and were outshot once in the qualifying round. Wednesday, they outshot the Bruins 12-5 to finish regulation after Boston’s go-ahead goal in the third. ... Edmundson’s four-game playoff winning streak, dating back to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup finals with the St. Louis Blues against the Bruins, came to an end. ... Jaccob Slavin played a game-high 37:03.
This story was originally published August 12, 2020 at 2:48 PM with the headline "‘Joke’ and ‘a crime scene’: Hurricanes coach Brind’Amour furious about NHL goal review."
