Superstar treatment in the NHL?
Arizona Coyotes second-year starter Louis Domingue accused the officials of such partiality Monday night, more specifically their inability to give him "the whistle" in a loss to Braden Holtby and the NHL-best Washington Capitals.
"I'm expecting that they treat every guy the same way, and I felt like because I don't have many games in this league I'm being treated differently," he said, according to Sarah McLellan of azcentral sports. "I think that if Holtby would have covered the puck this way, they would have blew the whistle right away.
"All game it was the same thing. I didn't have the whistle."
He added: "It's just unacceptable that they don't treat us the same way."
Domingue's beef was engendered in the third, when he stopped a slap shot from Tom Wilson and appeared to cover up the puck. However, it was dug out from under his glove and jammed in by Mike Richards - a goal that proved to be the eventual game-winner.
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The Montreal Canadiens announced Monday that defenseman Tom Gilbert will undergo surgery on his left knee and miss the remainder of the season.
The 33-year-old left Friday's game against the Philadelphia Flyers after blocking a shot during the second period.
Gilbert had one goal, one assist, and a plus-3 rating in 45 games for the Canadiens this season.
With Gilbert heading to injured reserve, the team has recalled defenseman Victor Bartley from the AHL's St. John's IceCaps.
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Forty-four, the fastest.
A 3-2 Washington Capitals win over the Arizona Coyotes on Monday saw Mike Richards score his first with the club, Alex Ovechkin notch his league-best 39th goal, and the team become the fastest in NHL history to hit 44 wins, needing only 58 games.
The @washcaps (44-10-4, 92 points) are 1st team in NHL history to win 44 of its 1st 58 games in a season. #ARIvsWSH pic.twitter.com/Z94aYo6fGy
— NHL Public Relations (@PR_NHL) February 23, 2016
The Capitals bumped their point total to 92 in the process, pushing their lead atop the Metropolitan Division to 18 points, and moving 11 clear of the Chicago Blackhawks in the race for the President's Trophy.
Braden Holtby backstopped the noteworthy - albeit slightly trivial - win, inching closer to a milestone of far greater significance in the process. The Vezina Trophy frontrunner is now just 10 wins shy of Martin Brodeur's single-season record with 24 games left on the schedule.
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It appears Craig Smith's greatest enemy is an empty net.
The Nashville Predators forward had a wide-open net in the final minute of overtime Monday against the Montreal Canadiens, but somehow managed to block his own one-timer attempt with his follow-through.
The blooper reminded many of a similar situation in 2011 when he skated alone towards an empty net against the Toronto Maple Leafs, and proceeded to shoot the puck over the glass in his attempt to roof an easy goal.
Thankfully for Smith, he redeemed himself in the shootout by scoring the game-deciding goal to give the Predators their third win in five games.
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Richie's first G. Great hustle Willy. #CapsYotes #RockTheRed pic.twitter.com/LKUPTz6DbK
— Washington Capitals (@washcaps) February 23, 2016
Mike Richards can finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Held without a point through his first 14 games with Washington, the veteran forward gave his new team a 3-1 lead Monday by drilling home his first goal as a member of the Capitals after Tom Wilson knocked the puck loose out from under the glove of Arizona Coyotes goalie Louis Domingue.
That’s Mike Richards’s first goal since January 3, 2015 with Los Angeles.
— Chris Gordon (@Chris_Gordon) February 23, 2016
"With my luck, I thought it'd be disallowed," Richards quipped after the game. A scrum ensued shortly after he scored, but his goal was met with a great reception from the Verizon Center fans who gave the 31-year-old a lengthy standing ovation.
Don't get goosebumps very often, but knowing Mike Richards as long as I have and what he's been through, that ovation did it. #CapitalsTalk
— Chuck Gormley (@ChuckGormleyCSN) February 23, 2016
The goal would stand as the game-winner with the Capitals hanging on to win 3-2. Evgeny Kuznetsov and Alex Ovechkin scored the other two Washington goals with the captain netting his league-leading 39th of the season, while Braden Holtby earned his NHL-best 38th win.
The Capitals have now own nine of their last 10 games and sit atop the Eastern Conference standings by a whopping 17 points ahead of their nearest competitors, the Florida Panthers.
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