The New Jersey Devils got burned by the NHL’s “intent to blow the whistle” rule on Tuesday night, and this one hit harder than most.
NHL Rule 31.2 spells it out this way: “As there is a human factor involved in blowing the whistle to stop play, the Referee may deem the play to be stopped slightly prior to the whistle actually being blown. The fact that the puck may come loose or cross the goal line prior to the sound of the whistle has no bearing if the Referee has ruled that the play had been stopped prior to this happening.”
That language came back to haunt the Devils in a way that left them staring at a goal that counted in every practical sense except the official one. Timo Meier fired the puck toward the net, it deflected off a Mammoth player with Karel Vejmelka down, and the puck eventually crossed the goal line.
Meier celebrated. The call, though, was no goal.
The ruling wiped out what would have made it 5-4 with about a minute left, and it effectively ended New Jersey’s chances of mounting a comeback. A power play was still coming, too, after MacKenzie Weager was called for a penalty during the scrum. But once the officials ruled the play dead, the Devils were out of runway.
The exact moment the whistle should have come into play is where this gets messy. The referees may have decided the puck had been touched and controlled after Meier’s shot, which would have stopped play automatically.
That kind of judgment lives in the referee’s hands, even if the rule book doesn’t spell out every possible wrinkle. The problem for New Jersey was that the whistle didn’t actually sound until multiple seconds after the puck was already in the net, and that’s a tough sequence to swallow.
The missed goal wasn’t the only frustration for the Devils. The officials also handed out a roughing penalty to Brendan Dillon that looked weak, along with a phantom penalty on Timo Meier that led to a goal against.
And beyond the officiating, New Jersey had bigger issues. The Devils had defensive breakdowns and didn’t get strong enough goaltending to survive the night.
It was another rough step for a team that came into the season with plenty of hype but has left fans feeling low instead. There are still 81 games to sort it out, and Sunny Mehta still likely has a few tricks up his sleeve before the season is lost quickly.
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