shmenguin wrote:In a vacuum, the ref should in no way assist a player in that situation. I guess guys like Mikey know about the factors that break the vacuum, but from the rest of our couches, that looked pretty unacceptable.
Without a doubt. When an official gets involved in the "aid" of one team or another, people will naturally be up in arms about it. That's completely understandable.
I've never reffed in the NHL. And, look, maybe I am wrong about this in this case, I know a couple refs that are pretty high up, I'll ask around and report back whatever I get, but when you're taught about officiating there are situations such as this where you have to use your best judgment. This is a rare one. But as I recall it, you have a player that is behind the play that cannot propel himself off the rink in any meaningful fashion, you may have players skating backwards at full speed coming toward that lame duck player, the player is near you/on your side of the ice, he's far from his bench and play is at the other end of the rink...
My split second judgment would be to propel the player to safety if I could do so...now, of course, play came back the other way and what happened, happened...and that's very unfortunate for us. To me, my initial instinct, would be do the same. He gave a couple strides and a shove...he didn't carry him on his back to the bench, he didn't anything but try to give a player in a tough spot a shove in the right direction without disrupting gameflow. Is the result of the play ideal? No, of course not. But you better believe if Sidney Crosby is in that situation, the same thing is going to happen. I've seen a ref kick a loose glove over to Crosby (Malkin? but I think it was Sid) before during play, these things happen. There is a lot more subjectivity and circumstance in hockey due to the speed of the game and its unique situations...some people can't handle that, some people sit there and focus on the referees all game and let themselves become consumed with officiating and ruin the game for themselves and others...
What happened is just not that big of a deal, I hate to break it to you(s)...