Goalie interference or not goalie interference? That is the question that continues to resurface in the NHL.
Per NHL rule 69, “Goals should be disallowed only if: (1) an attacking player, either by his positioning or by contact, impairs the goalkeeper’s ability to move freely within his crease or defend his goal; or (2) an attacking player initiates intentional or deliberate contact with a goalkeeper, inside or outside of his goal crease.“
However, it’s a rule with a lot of grey area, which leads to a lot of inconsistency from one game to another and one officiating crew to another.
Bruins goaltending coach Bob Essensa did his best to explain it when he appeared on NESN’s “Morning Bru” Friday with Billy Jaffe and Andrew Raycroft.
“I have a better feel than I had maybe a week ago, a year ago, a month ago,” Essensa said. “Quite honestly, when we look at a goal, obviously, a goal against, we’re thinking of challenging. … To me, sometimes it’s a coin flip what the league’s looking at.
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“And in the most respect, it’s probably a very difficult call. In some respects, I’d rather go back to the gold old days where the ref makes the call. … I know that it’s a better system now than then. But, quite honestly, there’s been a handful of calls that we’ve tried to make that I said, ‘This is guaranteed coming back.’ And, it ends up on the scoreboard.”
Essensa added: “I wish I could say that I know exactly what’s going to be called and what isn’t. But I know if my (goalie) is in his crease and he gets bumped, a guy that doesn’t get shoved in there, it probably should come back.”
Former Bruins goaltender and NESN analyst Raycroft explained that goalie interference is not simply when a netminder gets run in the crease or taken out of the play with incidental contact.
“If a guy’s taking a slapper on you from 15, 20 feet away, that’s gonna go 90 miles an hour, don’t tell me that a guy nudging me only an inch doesn’t affect my ability to stop the puck with no one around,” Raycroft said. “And that’s where as goalies, I think, we get annoyed with, is that somebody’s telling me that, ‘No, that guy just barely touched you. That doesn’t affect your ability to make a save.
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“That’s what’s crazy to us as players. No, that’s a big deal, and good luck trying to make that save without getting nudged.”
Featured image via Jerome Miron/Imagn Images