Boys and girls in Vegas, tough loss tonite. Love your team and as an impartial fan I'm rooting for your team this series.
Canuck fan for 40 years (yeah...glutton for punishment) so trust me when I say that I feel for you guys tonight. However I'm going to give you all a little knowledge that I want to take to heart - otherwise you will let this game eat you up.
When it comes to officiating in the regular season a penalty is a penalty no matter what time of the game it occurs in, nor the circumstance.
But we all need to realize that when it comes to the playoffs the rules of play are a completely different animal. You need to know this - the referees will NEVER give a team a win in the playoffs - ever. When it comes to a 50-50 call on a goal you can be rest assured that the goal will almost never be allowed. If the opposition team goes into the penalty box you can almost be assured that the referees will even it up as soon as humanly possible by either negating the power play, or giving the opponents a power play shortly thereafter.
The only penalties that will be called are obvious penalties where if the official misses it he would be badly criticized and thus can't avoid calling it. Otherwise there's a saying "the whistles go into the pockets" especially as the playoffs go deeper and the later in the game it is. And if lady luck is on your side and your team advances into the next round or heaven forbid into the finals, you're going to be witness to unimaginable hacking and slashing and crosschecks and you're going to find it incredulous that the referees seem to miss most of them.
This is all by design. The league does not want to give a team a win in the playoffs. If a team is going to win a game, a series, or the cup they must TAKE it and there be no question they deserve it.
As soon as there was any question that there might be goalie interference in OT there was no way that goal was going to be allowed.
We as fans have all been where you are tonite (believe me...Canucks fans know) and it can be such a hateful place to be. But from many respects this is also why we as long time hockey fans love this game too. The team that wins the cup has to punch, kick, bite, claw, kill or die to earn it. I'm sure some of you were exhausted just watching this game tonite - you're only into game 2 of the 2nd round. Just wait until you get 2 months into playoff hockey and see how exhausted you are - and you aren't even playing. These players are going to war - and for your boys there just getting into it now - and there's still a looooooong way to go yet, especially if they're going to win it.
These kids are going to break their fingers, lose their teeth, suffer incredible pain and be exhausted physically and mentally if they manage to delve past this 2nd round. Its a war of attrition and its supposed to be that way. Right now it may have seemed easy with 5 wins in a row until tonite. I promise you it won't be. And I can also promise you that if you guys do end up ever winning the cup you wouldn't want it any other way either.
Keep your chins up boys and girls. You're only at game 3...your team needs to go into enemy territory and win at least one of two and get home ice advantage back!!! Positive vibes!!
Go KNIGHTS!!!!!