Mr. Referee, Downgrade This Call!

Scouting The Refs Podcast

This week on the #RefsPodcast, we discuss a pair of major penalties that were downgraded after officials' review. The Panthers’ Dmitry Kulikov had a major penalty reduced to a minor for hit on Rangers’ Alex Wennberg and the Rangers’ Jacob Trouba saw his elbowing major on Florida’s Evan Rodrigues dropped to a minor… neither with any explanation as to why the refs felt neither play deserved a major penalty. Remember, those penalty reviews are handled by the refs – not the Situation Room. Player Safety appeared to disagree on the Trouba call, handing out a $5000 fine for the elbow.

When teams take two penalties on the same play - as Trouba did - should teams be given the option to choose between a four-minute 5-on-4 or a two-minute 5-on-3? What about giving teams the option to pick between a power play and a penalty shot?

Down goes Marchment! The refs thought Mason Marchment embellished a cross-check from the Edmonton Oilers’ Zach Hyman.

Dallas Stars goaltender Jake Oettinger’s stick made a perfectly legal save on its own, but that’s not always the case. .

Should the Panthers have been awarded a penalty shot after New York’s Blake Wheeler hooked Alexander Barkov? Do they even CALL penalty shots in overtime?

Florida’s Sam Reinhart gets away with punching New York’s Jacob Trouba at the whistle; no call on the play with Reinhart scoring the overtime winner… should he have been in the box?

Also, the Rangers’ Chris Kreider narrowly avoided a misconduct penalty for throwing Matthew Tkachuk’s mouthguard out of play… not that the officials were going to call that one.

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The Scouting The Refs Podcast is a weekly look at the world of officiating and player safety within the National Hockey League, AHL, ECHL, and other leagues around the world. We'll break down the calls and the rules behind them to help understand why a penalty or suspension was - or wasn't - handed out.

Todd Lewis is a veteran broadcaster covering the NHL and other major league sports. Lewis is a former host on the NHL Network and on NHL Network Radio. He’s also worked for TSN, Sportsnet as a host/anchor and is a producer of other programs.

Josh Smith is the founder of Scouting the Refs, the leading independent site related to hockey officiating which follows hockey officials across the NHL, AHL, ECHL, and other leagues around the world, including news, rule changes and interpretations, suspensions, and statistics on officials and penalty calls.

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