My Surpise Stance on NHL Officiating

[Minstrel]

I never cease to surpise myself; why? Because I know what I like but I am also open to getting enough info to make a decision. I am an old school diehard hockey fan. I don't want to see this turn into the No Hit League and am very leery of 'Bettman Changes'. I figured after preseason and my first night of 'New NHL' hockey I'd be spitting nails. Surpise! I'm not. I now find that I agree completely with the way the game is being called.

If you saw the physicality of the Toronto game for example you'll know they are not legislating the physicality out of hockey as was my initial fear. What I did see was TONS of penalties, 99% of which should be called!

For example: You step into a guy's lane as he tries to go past you to get the puck or make a 'pick play' and you go to the box. You put your stick in a guy's ribs from behind? Grab a seat. 'Tie up your man' on the side of the faceoff dot? That will be two. Cross check a guy and knock him down in front of the net by trying to realign his vertebrae with repeated blows to the spine? How about a couple minutes to reconsider that tactic? Fantastic. I liked what I was seeing called. I liked seeing Tom Fitzgerald get called for hooking twice in the last three minutes of the game, once with only seconds remaining.

Better yet I like what wasn't being called too. Defensemen could still hit players with the puck. They could still shove guys from the crease if they were strong enough to do so. Power forwards were still blowing people up and in general being scary to play against. Beating a goalie wasn't like trying to figure out time travel.

I thought this 'parade to the penalty box' would infuriate me but now I see it as actually having a shot at reclaiming the game with all of it's speed and power intact. You'll notice teams like Vancouver that challenged themselves to embrace the new standard (and were among the teams that emphasized skating before) were called for only five penalties their whole first game. As I saw it tonight for 5 hours or so it punishes those that should be punished and I say amen to that.

Teams were exposed for their flaws. Not everyone seemed to be working with basically the same skillset/chance to make an impact. Now I just hope they do stick with it because the current ugly I think is worth the flashes of what could be a whole lot of fun to watch.