Today the Minnesota Wild got to play in front of their home fans against the Chicago Blackhawks.
So far this season the Minnesota Wild have been one of the best teams in the NHL while the Chicago Blackhawks have been one of the worst.
With this in mind, the Minnesota Wild were hoping to take care of business and bring home a win against an inferior opponent.
Late in the game, the Minnesota Wild found themselves leading against the Blackhawks 3-2 with goals from Marco Rossi and Jared Spurgeon.
In desperation mode, the Chicago Blackhawks decided to pull their goaltender as they tried to tie the game up and steal a point from the Minnesota Wild.
With the net empty the Wild made a push for an empty net goal that would lead to incredible controversy.
Minnesota Wild veteran Marcus Foligno would get into a foot race with Chicago Blackhawks defenseman Alex Vlasic.
On the play in question, Marcus Foligno seems to beat Alex Vlasic to the loose puck and put it home for an easy goal.
However, the referees on the ice had other opinions and called the play an icing instead.
Despite pleas from Marcus Foligno and the Wild coaching staff the call was not changed and things remained tight.
Luckily for the Minnesota Wild the missed call would not come back to haunt them as they would pull out a win 3-2.
This is once again an example of an NHL referee making a blatantly wrong call and having to face no repercussions for the mistake.
In every other area of sports when a player or coach messes up they are expected to face the media and explain their thought process.
For some reason, this is not the case with referees in the NHL or any other sport.
One has to wonder how long it will be before we get post-game press conferences with the referees involved after big calls like this are missed.
POLL | ||
Do you think NHL referees should have to face the media when they make incorrect calls? | ||
Yes | 160 | 85.6 % |
No | 27 | 14.4 % |
List of polls |