Wednesday night’s Capitals-Red Wings game in Washington provided one of the worst blown calls that we’ve seen so far this NHL season. Detroit was absolutely jobbed of a goal in the first period when Caps goalie Braden Holtby played a puck behind his net, then tripped (on his own accord) while attempting to get back to the crease, allowing Wings forward Drew Miller to score an easy goal on a mostly wide-open net.
But referees waved the goal off because they believed that Detroit’s Luke Glendening had interfered with Holtby behind the goal line, causing him to fall down as he ventured back to the net. Obviously, as the replays show, this wasn’t true at all; there was no contact whatsoever with Glendening.
It was clearly the wrong call and, on top of that, a penalty was given to Glendening. While you can’t expect human officials to be right all the time, it’s embarrassing that this one was gotten so wrong, especially considering all four of the on-ice officials were in a position to reverse the call. Tough break for Detroit.
