DENVER — Let’s start with the obvious: Tuesday night’s matchup between the Edmonton Oilers and the Colorado Avalanche was a tightly contested hockey game. The Oilers capitalized on their chances, executed when it mattered most, and ultimately earned the victory.
That much is straightforward.
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What is far less straightforward, however, is the officiating that unfolded throughout the night.
Regardless of which team you support — whether it’s the Oilers, the Avalanche, the Dallas Stars, the Detroit Red Wings, or anyone else — every rational fan ultimately wants the same thing: a sport where the rules are enforced competently and consistently. Tuesday’s game unfortunately provided another example of how far the NHL still has to go in that department.
The first moment that raised eyebrows came with a hooking penalty assessed to Brett Kulak. The call was extremely ticky-tack and, in my view, didn’t truly meet the standard for hooking.
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The Oilers did what good teams do — they took advantage. They converted on the ensuing power play and made the Avalanche pay.
And to be fair, bad call or not, you still have to play the game and keep the puck out of your net. The Avalanche have been one of the league’s better penalty-killing units all season, so that is one situation where Colorado still needed to be better regardless of the circumstances.
But consistency matters.
Later in the game, Evan Bouchard appeared to clearly hold Valeri Nichushkin’s stick against the boards. The play developed seemingly right in front of the officials, yet no penalty was called.
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From a consistency standpoint, that sequence looked far more like a textbook penalty than the one Kulak had been assessed earlier in the night.
That observation alone shouldn’t be controversial.
The real controversy came late in the second period, when Nathan MacKinnon was ejected from the game after being assessed a major penalty for goaltender interference — resulting in the first game misconduct of his NHL career.
The play occurred while Colorado trailed 2–1 and was on the power play.
MacKinnon entered the offensive zone with speed before receiving an east-to-west pass from Martin Necas. His shot sailed wide of the net, and as he pursued the rebound along the goal line, Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse closed in from behind.
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Nurse made contact with MacKinnon’s left hip, subtly but significantly altering the Avalanche star’s path just as he attempted to avoid the crease.
With his skates angled left in an effort to steer clear of goaltender Connor Ingram, MacKinnon instead lost his lane and collided with the goaltender along the goal line. The impact forced Ingram from the game.
First and foremost, everyone hopes Ingram is okay. No one wants to see a player get injured in that fashion — regardless of team allegiance.
But even a basic understanding of physics makes the situation easier to interpret. When a 6-foot-4, 215-pound defenseman like Nurse makes contact with a player moving at high speed just inches from the crease, the margin for avoiding a collision becomes extremely small. Add in the fact that Ingram was leaning forward to play the puck, and the window for MacKinnon to escape the situation essentially disappears.
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If that interpretation sounds reasonable, it’s because it’s not just fans saying it.
John Wroblewski — head coach of the U.S. women’s Olympic gold medal-winning team — joined the PuckAroundPod and offered his perspective on the play:
“Mack was going to the net as hard as he could legally,” he explained. “I thought his route was going to take him above the paint and I thought he got nudged, hit by an extremely sturdy D, Darnell Nurse, who’s one of the biggest frames in the league. That doesn’t take much to, you know, to knock a train slightly off the rails.
“It was completely out of character for MacKinnon to run a goalie and isn’t in his brand. I’m chalking the whole thing up to inadvertent contact. The whistle gets blown. The (concussion) spotters did a great job getting Connor the help that he needed. And the faceoff should have been outside the zone with no penalty assessed.”
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Retired goaltender Tuukka Rask, who played for 15 years in the NHL, all with the Boston Bruins, stated on TNT that he didn’t agree with the five-minute major assessed to MacKinnon.
“I don’t think so,” he stated. “I’m all about protecting the goalies; this is just the perfect storm. Ingram’s in a tough spot, stretching, Nurse is cutting the pass off on one knee basically.
“MacKinnon, I feel like he wants to get out of the way, but then he runs into Nurse, and then it’s just a perfect storm. Sucks for Ingram getting hurt like that.”
Beyond the specific ruling Tuesday night, the play highlighted a much larger issue that has quietly grown into one of the NHL’s most frustrating officiating problems: goaltender interference has become wildly inconsistent.
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Night after night, similar plays are judged completely differently.
To see how confusing the standard has become, it’s worth revisiting a moment from last season.
On January 2, the Avalanche defeated the Buffalo Sabres 6–5 at Ball Arena in one of the most chaotic games of the year. During that contest, Parker Kelly made contact with Zach Benson near the crease. The bump caused Benson to tumble directly into the right leg of Avalanche goaltender Scott Wedgewood, knocking him violently to the ice.
Wedgewood immediately went down in visible pain and remained sprawled in the crease.
Despite the fact that the goaltender was clearly injured and unable to defend the net, play continued. No whistle was blown. Moments later, Benson circled behind the net and scored on a wraparound while Wedgewood was still incapacitated.
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Avalanche head coach Jared Bednar pressed the officials for an explanation. The reasoning he received was that the whistle was not blown because the collision had been caused by an Avalanche player.
That explanation is exactly why Tuesday night’s ruling raises so many questions.
Using that same logic, the play involving MacKinnon and Ingram should have resulted in a whistle and a faceoff — not a major penalty and an ejection. MacKinnon’s path into the crease had clearly been altered by contact from Nurse of the Oilers.
Instead, the result was the first game misconduct of MacKinnon’s career.
Hockey is a fast sport. Officials are human, and mistakes are inevitable over the course of an 82-game season.
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But there’s a difference between the occasional missed call and a pattern of inconsistency that leaves players, coaches, and fans genuinely unsure about how the rules are being interpreted.
When blatant slashes — like the one delivered by Zach Hyman on Brock Nelson — go uncalled, or when goaltenders like Tristan Jarry can slash players such as Parker Kelly skating to the net without consequence, it becomes increasingly difficult to defend the standard being applied on the ice.
And to be clear, this isn’t about blaming the Oilers. Any team in the league would take advantage of lenient officiating if it’s clear certain plays are going to be ignored.
The responsibility lies with the league.
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From the standpoint of the NHL and the sport as a whole, the expectation should be simple: the rules need to be enforced with as much consistency as possible.
No one is asking for perfection.
But when major penalties, game misconducts, and injury-related plays are involved, the margin for error becomes extremely small — especially with the postseason approaching.
The last thing the NHL wants is a blown call, an inconsistent interpretation, or an avoidable officiating mistake deciding an entire playoff series.
Or worse, the Stanley Cup Final.
Because in today’s era of instant replay, viral clips, and nonstop social media discussion, moments like that don’t just disappear. They linger. They get dissected from every angle. And over time, repeated controversies like these begin to chip away at something far more important than a single game result: fan trust.
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And that’s something the league simply cannot afford to lose.
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