Bob wrote, in part..
>There also could be a differentiation between various types of minor
>penalties.  On slashes, boarding, high sticking and crosschecks, the person
>penalized should be forced to stay in the box for the full 2 minutes even if
>the opposing team scores one or more goals. ...
 
Good theory, but I doubt it would work.  Working against you would be
the reluctance of a(n already reluctant) referee to call the more severe
penalty because it would have such a dramatic effect on the game outcome.
 
>                                        ...  It would also be useful if the
>trailing linesman would watch behind the play where a lot of slashing etc.
>takes place.
 
How's this different from the current situation?  The key here is that
the officials in hockey are not a co-equal team, but a dictator and a
couple of "go-fers".  The disadvantage to our system (either 1 or 2 or 3
refs) is that the non-senior people will *NOT* call anything unless they
are *SURE* the head ref missed the play ...  and that's not going to
happen very often.
 
The recent change to *CALLING* hitting from behind into the boards goes
against my pessimism.  Maybe hockey can find a way to weed out these
other unnecessary and dangerous actions?
 
Yours in college hockey,
 
Wayne T. Smith          Systems Group -- UNET (formerly CAPS/ENM)
[log in to unmask]           University of Maine System
Co-owner of the College Hockey lists - Hockey-L/Info-Hockey-L/Hockey3