It was a necessary touch on Monday when the NHL apologized to the Edmonton Oilers after a blown call Sunday night against the Anaheim Ducks.
For all the years I’ve watched or covered hockey I’ve never seen anything like what happened to Theo Peckham. He cleared the puck through the hole in the glass for photographers.
What are the odds? Apparently not impossible because referee Stephen Walkom could have sworn the Oilers defenceman cleared the puck directly over the glass. It led to an unwarranted delay of game penalty. Despite the pleading of Peckham, Walkom had already made up his mind.
The news worsened for Edmonton when Anaheim scored on the ensuing power play. Then 22 seconds later another goal and a 2-0 lead disappeared. Momentum gone but thankfully the game wasn’t. The Oilers could laugh about the incident afterwards because they still won 4-2, but it wasn’t very funny at the time. The problem was the play couldn’t be reviewed. Unlike a potential goal that might be waved off or be allowed, Walkom couldn’t go upstairs for clarification.
It might be time to reconsider what is reviewable. The call cost Edmonton a man, a goal and nearly the game. I feel for Walkom because he couldn’t have actually seen it otherwise his decision should have been the correct one. However, sometimes you go through the steps quickly in your head and come to a conclusion that nothing else but what you decided could have happened.
The Ducks were pleading for a call which may have influenced him. Even though I’m not so sure they saw what happened. Apparently Peckham and the photographer were the only one’s who knew what happened. Walkom’s striped friends didn’t see it either.
I mean the incident was as likely as a team scoring into its’ own net… wait a minute, that happened as well. Is it possible both occurred within the same 60 minutes? The answer is yes.
As strange as the call against Peckham was, you’d rather be him than Corey Perry. When a kid gets told to put the puck on the net normally it doesn’t need to be clarified that the coach means the other team’s net — not your own.
With the Ducks pressing for an equalizer and Jonas Hiller on the bench, Perry, who ironically leads the Ducks in goals, scored another one… into the wide open cage at his end of the ice. Perry stood just off to one side of Devan Dubnyk by the boards and behind the goal line when he centred the puck out front. Nothing but open ice awaited the puck until it slid harmfully into Anaheim’s net.
Then the scrambling began for the goal scorer. Did it hit Dubnyk for his first NHL goal? Or maybe 17-assist man Ryan Whitney, (who had just missed a wide-open empty net,) for his first of the season? Turns out it was neither, as Tom Gilbert got credit for the goal. His third of the season but the first one he never really scored.
That capped off what truly was a weird and quacky night in Anaheim.