November 30, 2005
Points of Annoyance
by Chris Dilks/Columnist
It seems foolish after a week in which we gave thanks to write an article complaining about the great sport of college hockey. I realize I'm not exactly the first person to give my thoughts on this issue, but then again, this column is called Second Thoughts for a reason.
Every season, the Men's Ice Hockey Rules Committee tries to improve the sport by giving coaches and officials suggestions on which rules they should more strictly enforce. It's basically their critique of the rulebook to try and make the game better.
It's a brilliant idea to make the game more appealing to fans and safer for players. The only problem is that this year's Points of Emphasis has a lot of good ideas that have created disasters on the ice.
One of the first areas that the rules committee went after was diving. This made sense; diving became more popular with last year's stricter enforcement of penalties. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a fan of seeing players flop to the ice any time they get touched, but does diving really need to be called? If I'm not mistaken, the point of calling penalties is to punish a player for using illegal means to gain an advantage. What advantage does a player gain by willingly taking himself out of the play? It's only an advantage if the opposing player goes to the penalty box. If referees quit sending opposing players to the box because the other player dives, that would correct the diving problem.
Another point of emphasis from the Rules Committee this year dealt with goaltenders covering the puck. Again, they had the right idea by wanting to get rid of unnecessary stoppages of play. But in practice, all this rule has done has created a lot of difficult judgment calls that make fans question why a goalie got a penalty for covering the puck.
One of the biggest problems with this rule is that it's one of the most poorly written rules in the rulebook. In the Points of Emphasis memo, the Committee refers to rule 4-7-e (emphasis mine):
"A minor penalty shall be assessed to a goalkeeper who, when located entirely outside the boundaries of the crease area (except to prevent a goal), deliberately falls on or gathers the puck into the body or who holds or places the puck against any part of the goal or against the boards."
What? When is a goalie not trying to prevent a goal? That's the type of thing that would send George Carlin into cardiac arrest. The rule is so unclear that I don't think anyone really knows how to interpret it.
But, by far, the point of emphasis that has caused the most controversy has been the emphasis on the checking from behind rule. Clearly nobody wants to see someone seriously hurt by a hit from behind, and a bad hit from behind should be severly punished. The problem is that hits that don't merit such a severe penalty, or no penalty at all, are also getting called.
Personally, when it comes to hits from behind, I use the gasp test. If a player gets hit from behind into the boards and it makes me gasp and hold my breath until he moves again, then I think that is a hit that is worth the five minute major and game misconduct.
If they want to make lesser hits from behind a penalty, there should be a smaller infraction for less dangerous hits, like a 2 minute minor and 10 minute misconduct. A 5 minute major penalty and a game misconduct has too much impact on a game to be called for a marginal hit from behind.
The other problem is the inconsistency with this penalty. Is there really any difference between putting someone into the boards head first with a check and putting them into the boards head first with a cross-check? The only difference is that one is a game-changing penalty, while the other is a harmless two minute minor.
Perhaps some of these calls will become more consistent with time. But this year's points of emphasis need to be reviewed because right now, it's created more inconsistent and unnecessary penalties that have made the game more confusing and frustrating for fans.
