• HOME
  • NHL Teams
    • Atlantic Division
      • Boston Bruins
      • Buffalo Sabres
      • Detroit Red Wings
      • Florida Panthers
      • Montreal Canadiens
      • Ottawa Senators
      • Tampa Bay Lightning
      • Toronto Maple Leafs
    • Metropolitan Division
      • Carolina Hurricanes
      • Columbus Blue Jackets
      • New Jersey Devils
      • New York Islanders
      • New York Rangers
      • Philadelphia Flyers
      • Pittsburgh Penguins
      • Washington Capitals
    • Central Division
      • Chicago Blackhawks
      • Colorado Avalanche
      • Dallas Stars
      • Minnesota Wild
      • Nashville Predators
      • St. Louis Blues
      • Winnipeg Jets
    • Pacific Division
      • Anaheim Ducks
      • Arizona Coyotes
      • Calgary Flames
      • Edmonton Oilers
      • Los Angeles Kings
      • San Jose Sharks
      • Seattle NHL
      • Vancouver Canucks
      • Vegas Golden Knights
  • NHL Rumors
  • NHL Prospects
  • Fantasy Hockey
  • THW Archives
  • More…
    • Columns
    • NWHL
    • Women’s Hockey
    • Other Leagues
    • Long Read
    • NHL Entry Draft
    • Books
    • NHL History
  • Log in
The Hockey Writers
  • Site Index
  • NHL Salary Caps
  • Hockey 101: A Beginner’s Guide
  • Join Our Team
  • Free Newsletter
  • Store
  • Log in
The Hockey Writers
  • HOME
  • NHL Teams
    • Atlantic Division
      • Boston Bruins
      • Buffalo Sabres
      • Detroit Red Wings
      • Florida Panthers
      • Montreal Canadiens
      • Ottawa Senators
      • Tampa Bay Lightning
      • Toronto Maple Leafs
    • Metropolitan Division
      • Carolina Hurricanes
      • Columbus Blue Jackets
      • New Jersey Devils
      • New York Islanders
      • New York Rangers
      • Philadelphia Flyers
      • Pittsburgh Penguins
      • Washington Capitals
    • Central Division
      • Chicago Blackhawks
      • Colorado Avalanche
      • Dallas Stars
      • Minnesota Wild
      • Nashville Predators
      • St. Louis Blues
      • Winnipeg Jets
    • Pacific Division
      • Anaheim Ducks
      • Arizona Coyotes
      • Calgary Flames
      • Edmonton Oilers
      • Los Angeles Kings
      • San Jose Sharks
      • Seattle NHL
      • Vancouver Canucks
      • Vegas Golden Knights
  • NHL Rumors
  • NHL Prospects
  • Fantasy Hockey
  • THW Archives
  • More…
    • Columns
    • NWHL
    • Women’s Hockey
    • Other Leagues
    • Long Read
    • NHL Entry Draft
    • Books
    • NHL History
Home
Commentary

The Problem With Playoff Officiating

By Brian Joyce April 17th, 2019

Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp

It is commonplace for fans to look for excuses when their team loses a game in the playoffs. Whether it be lack of rest or bad bounces, there will always be a section of a team’s fanbase looking for somewhere to place the blame. The most prevalent excuse is poor officiating.

It is worth noting that despite any perceived impact by the officials, the better team is usually the one that wins the game. While this is a problem league-wide, here we will take an in depth look at Game 2 of the Toronto Maple Leafs first round series against the Boston Bruins. The Bruins were the better team all night long, outscoring and out-working the Leafs with relative ease. They forced Toronto to play the game their way and it did not go well for the Maple Leafs. The game also served as a microcosm of the problems with playoff officiating as a whole.

Equal Does Not Mean Fair

One would think that a team that plays fast and skilled would draw more penalties than average. The team’s style of play would be ideal for drawing hooking and tripping penalties as their opponents would often be forced to resort to such tactics to try and slow the game down. However, that is not the case.

Penalty Minutes Drawn/Taken
A graph showing the correlation between each team’s penalty minutes drawn and taken. Courtesy of moneypuck.com

This graph illustrates the correlation between the number of penalties a team takes and how many they draw. The left side represents the average penalty minutes each team took during the 2018-19 regular season. The higher a team sits on the graph, the more penalty minutes they took. The bottom represents the average penalty minutes each team drew. The farther a team sits to the right means they were able to draw more penalties than those to the left.

These stats are from this regular season and they show that the Maple Leafs were the team that had the fewest penalty minutes drawn and taken by far. This would not be as much of an issue if the rest of the league did not follow the same trajectory. Because Toronto plays a style less likely to result in penalties, the officials are also refereeing their opponents with the same eyes.

The graph shows a straight line going from the bottom left to the top right, meaning that the referees are more likely to try and call a balanced number of penalties than actually following the rulebook. Perhaps the perfect example of this came in the first period when Nazem Kadri and Jake DeBrusk got tangled up and DeBrusk gave Kadri a few shots to the face. Despite not retaliating, Kadri found himself in the box alongside DeBrusk with a roughing penalty.

Where this really becomes an issue is when the Leafs play a team at the other end of the spectrum, such as the Bruins. The Bruins are known for being one of the roughest and toughest teams in the NHL, a status that has been earned by years of chippy play. When the Maple Leafs and the Bruins play, the Bruins should be receiving close to three penalty minutes more than the Leafs. That is not the case. By attempting to call penalties equally, the referees have allowed the Bruins to play their style of play with little fear of being reprimanded. Credit to the Bruins, they have been able to learn how to use this to their advantage for the better part of the last decade.

The Whistle Gets Put Away

Referees are more lenient with calls in the playoffs. What would normally be a slashing or hooking penalty is less likely to be called in these high-stakes games. While this is widely accepted, it does stand to raise an issue when the penalties being ignored go from hooking and slashing to elbowing and interference.

Jake DeBrusk
Jake DeBrusk of the Boston Bruins (Photo by Kevin Sousa/NHLI via Getty Images)

There are a pair of problems with the philosophy of putting the whistles away for the playoffs. First, calls are obviously missed. Second, things tend to escalate. The first leads to the second if left unchecked. Throughout the game there were a number of major calls that went unnoticed on both sides. The most talked about one being DeBrusk’s knee-on-knee hit to Kadri. While analysts discussed whether or not it should have been a penalty, this was arguably the tipping point in a game that had seen over a half-dozen missed calls.

The notion that hockey in the regular season and hockey in the playoffs should be called by different rules is a bizarre one. It is the exact same game played by the exact same people, yet the rules stop being enforced when they arguably matter the most. Imagine if in the MLB postseason the umpires stopped enforcing rules involving the defensive team obstructing the baselines. If all of a sudden a first baseman could block the path of the hitter to first base without any repercussions, it would change the game entirely. It would not make sense then, so why should it make sense in the NHL?

The bigger problem in this situation is escalation. While these players are grown men and should be able to utilize restraint in these situations, it is also the job of the officials to minimize incidents like we saw in this game. Due to the back-and-forth play between Kadri and DeBrusk, by the time DeBrusk delivered a hit to Patrick Marleau, Kadri had enough.

He crosschecked DeBrusk, resulting in a match penalty and a suspension lasting the remainder of the first round. This was not a smart thing to do by any means. Kadri is a repeat offender and this incident had Brian Burke questioning whether he will receive as much as a five-game suspension. DeBrusk had gotten under his skin, but Kadri needed to keep his cool in this game and he did not. His outburst here cost the Leafs one of their best forwards for the rest of the first round. He essentially sealed Toronto’s fate in the game as the five-minute major lasted for most of the remaining third period. If the game had been properly policed and had penalties been enforced, it is far less likely that this situation happens.

Nazem Kadri
Toronto Maple Leafs’ Nazem Kadri (THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP/Michael Dwyer)

To reiterate, the Maple Leafs did not deserve to win this game. Much of the team failed to show up and the Bruins dictated the pace of the game, which led to a dominant performance. That play was compounded by mistakes made by William Nylander and a big mistake from Kadri that has fans getting feelings of deja vu, as discussed by SportsNet’s Chris Johnston.

That does not excuse the officiating that was on full display at TD Garden. The issues with playoff hockey were illustrated perfectly throughout this entire game and it seems very unlikely that these issues will be fixed anytime soon.

  • Tags
  • 2019 NHL Playoffs
  • NHL Officiating
Facebook Twitter LinkedIn WhatsApp

Facebook Comments

Editor’s Picks
Martin St. Louis, the Little Big Man

Martin St. Louis, the Little Big Man

9358
'Mr. Hockey' Gordie Howe

'Mr. Hockey' Gordie Howe

9824
Recent Posts
Dec 11th 12:59 AM
Chicago Blackhawks

Fleury Returns, Leads Vegas to 5-1 Win over Blackhawks

Dec 11th 12:35 AM
Toronto Maple Leafs

Tavares Scores Twice, Andersen Comes up Big in Third as Leafs Beat Canucks

Dec 10th 11:59 PM
Arizona Coyotes

Flames’ Win Streak at 6 Games with 5-2 Win over Coyotes

Dec 10th 11:47 PM
Carolina Hurricanes

Sebastian Aho Scores Twice, Hurricanes Beat Oilers 6-3

Dec 10th 11:45 PM
Detroit Red Wings

Blake Wheeler Sparks Offence, Jets Hand Red Wings 12th Straight Loss

Dec 10th 11:35 PM
Florida Panthers

Stamkos, Vasilevskiy Lead Lightning to 2-1 Win over Panthers

Dec 10th 11:31 PM
Dallas Stars

Stars Win Bowness’ 1st Game as Coach, Shut out Devils 2-0

Dec 10th 11:26 PM
Anaheim Ducks

Ducks Top Wild 3-2 in Shootout

Dec 10th 11:25 PM
Buffalo Sabres

Eichel Scores Twice, Sabres Top Blues 5-2

Dec 10th 11:15 PM
Montreal Canadiens

Canadiens End Jarry’s Shutout Streak, Race past Penguins 4-1

Stay in Touch
Contact Us

Via our Newsletters
RSS Feeds

Privacy Statement

Our Partners
HFBoards

About THW…

Founded in 2009, The Hockey Writers is a premier destination for news and information on everything hockey. Updated daily with news and features from over 130 writers worldwide. Over 2 million monthly readers now come to THW for their hockey fix.

Join over 18 000 Subscribers of our free bi-weekly Newsletter.

© The Hockey Writers 2018. All rights reserved.
logo
  • HOME
  • Hockey Headlines
  • NHL Rumors
  • Atlantic Division
    • Boston Bruins
    • Buffalo Sabres
    • Detroit Red Wings
    • Florida Panthers
    • Montreal Canadiens
    • Ottawa Senators
    • Tampa Bay Lightning
    • Toronto Maple Leafs
  • Metropolitan Division
    • Carolina Hurricanes
    • Columbus Blue Jackets
    • New Jersey Devils
    • New York Islanders
    • New York Rangers
    • Philadelphia Flyers
    • Pittsburgh Penguins
    • Washington Capitals
  • Central Division
    • Chicago Blackhawks
    • Colorado Avalanche
    • Dallas Stars
    • Minnesota Wild
    • Nashville Predators
    • St Louis Blues
    • Winnipeg Jets
  • Pacific Division
    • Anaheim Ducks
    • Arizona Coyotes
    • Calgary Flames
    • Edmonton Oilers
    • Los Angeles Kings
    • San Jose Sharks
    • Seattle NHL
    • Vegas Golden Knights
    • Vancouver Canucks
  • Store
  • The THW Archives
  • Prospects
  • The Goalie Page
  • NHL Salary Cap Information
  • Join Our Team
  • Search THW