> > - No penalties were called in the entire game!  UAA is definately a
> >   classy hockey team, and it was nice to see a game for once that skills
> >   decided the contest, not brute strength.
 
>   I've always wanted to attend a penalty-free hockey game (well, at least
> insofar as the officials see it :-) but, despite coming close several
 
I wonder if this came down from WCHA administration...there were hardly ANY
penalties called in the Wisconsin/Denver series this weekend.  The outcome
would not have been much different if there were just 2 linesmen out there
(except for that one checking from behind call that took a DU player out of
the game).
 
I haven't seen a game with that many HARD hits on the boards and general
tripping/hooking/slashing/etc. behind the play when the refs obviously weren't
looking or didn't want to look.  This was the first game I've seen both
goalies get cross-checked in less than two minutes, among other things.
 
I wonder if these guys are aspiring to the ranks of Ron Foyt, whom we
Madisonians have the pleasure of seeing these days as a Colonial Hockey League
referee for the CHL team here in town.  FWIW: I've seen MUCH cleaner games
called in CHL play than what I saw Friday night (note: I haven't seen a clean
game with Foyt at the whistle...)
 
It seemed someone rattled Thomas' ears before the Saturday match, which lasted
for about 15 minutes.  I'm not sure what the reasoning for making calls after
that was--maybe whether the time remaining in the period was a multiple of 3.
 
I was pleasantly surprised to see the Badgers match the style of play on
Friday night, at least for the first 2 periods.  After that, well, things went
downhill, and we paid the price for it.
 
Saturday was, well, a typical Saturday home game.  There wasn't any one thing
that went wrong for Wisconsin, but a lot of little things that didn't go as
planned.  Even if the refs did call a tight game (or even attempt to control
it), it wouldn't have made much of a difference.
 
John Perkins
 
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