Photo: CBS Boston
The NHL announced on Wednesday that Carolina Hurricanes head coach Rod Brind’Amour was fined $25,000 for calling the officials “a joke” after they did not blow the play dead when goaltender Petr Mrazek covered the puck and the Boston Bruins knocked it loose and scored to make it 2-1 just 4:28 into the second.
He challenged the play, but the NHL ruled that the officials had actually ruled something else wrong. In addition to getting the goal, the Bruins got a power-play.
“This is why the league’s a joke, in my opinion, on these things,” Brind’Amour told Raleigh’s News & Observer. “That one is a crime scene.”
The League also threatened Brind’Amour with an additional fine of $25,000 should a similar incident over the next year.
“They came to me, and I said, ‘If he has possession of it then it’s goalie interference. If he doesn’t have possession then it’s a hand pass. It’s one of the two. I don’t know what you’re calling on the ice,” Brind’Amour said, according to the N&O. “All he has to do is tell me, ‘We’re calling it nonpossession (by Mrazek),’ then we’re challenging a glove-hand pass. If it’s possession, then goaltender interference. I said, ‘Tell me the call on the ice.’ They wouldn’t do it when I say, ‘What is the call?’ So I had to flip a coin. …
“I said, ‘What was the call on the ice?’ and he said, ‘You’ve got to call one or the other.’ It should be so easy. If they said the goalie had it, then it’s an easy call. They wouldn’t tell you. It makes no sense. I know we weren’t the better team, but if that goal doesn’t go in, do we win that game? I don’t know.”
The Hurricanes lost Game 1 to the Bruins by a score of 4-3 in double overtime and trail the best-of-seven series, 1-0.
From NHL
The NHL released the following statement Wednesday night:
“NEW YORK (Aug. 12, 2020) – Carolina Hurricanes head coach Rod Brind’Amour has been fined $25,000 for comments following Game 1 of the team’s First Round series against the Boston Bruins, the National Hockey League announced today. Additionally, Brind’Amour has been assessed a conditional fine of $25,000, which will be collected, in addition to any subsequent discipline, in the event of similar inappropriate behavior through Aug. 12, 2021.
The fine money goes to the NHL Foundation.”
By Harrison Brown
