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