[united]

What a gutless job by the officials. They should really be ashamed with themselves after that.

Looking over the penalty summary a couple hours after the game, it was apparent the officials didn't even penalize Witkoswki for coming back onto the ice. He already had 5+game for the fight and antics with Kulak, but that was it. They have retroactively added an additional two game misconducts to his name, which will all but guarantee he gets the 10-game suspension. How, at the time, he gets off with nothing while the Flames end up on a five-minute penalty kill is inexcusable. For that alone both referees should be reprimanded.

Watching Mantha pound away on Hamonic was disgusting. That's bushleague. Even watching the replays, he has a linesman draped all over his back and he's still starting the lawn mower until eventually his own teammate, Scott Wilson, grabs his arm and stops him. Credit to Wilson there, as the linesman was doing everything he could to put a stop to it but couldn't catch Mantha's arm. Looks like Mantha got hit with an extra game misconduct (two in total) at the time, so the linesman likely called that. Hopefully he gets some discipline as well.

Credit also due to Versteeg and Abdelkader for grabbing Ferland and Athanasiou respectively after their initial shots over the boards. 79 and 72 might lose a few dollars tomorrow for their actions.

Back to the idiots in stripes, Backlund gives one of them a little drive-by chirp - not even screaming in his face or chasing after him - and gets two and game. What a joke. You completely botched the chance the quickly deescalate a blowout and when a player calls you out on it you escalate things even further and toss him? That's so weak. Let's hope no feelings were hurt. And who knows what even happened to Brouwer but looks like he put a referee out day-to-day with hurt feelings, too.