“Canucks forward Alexandre Burrows did not hold back about what he felt were unjust penalty calls, ripping into NHL referee Stephane Auger after Vancouver’s 3-2 loss to the Nashville Predators on Monday night.
Burrows, who was called for diving in the second period and interference in the third, also received a 10-minute misconduct with seconds left in the game, and he was not shy his post-game interview.” (Source:TSN)
What an interesting situation last night in Vancouver. The referee in the spot light is Stephane Auger (his last name is pronounced o-j). According to Burrows, Auger came to him before the Anthem to let him know he would be getting retribution against Burrows for an incident earlier in the year, a hit Burrows received in a game against the Predators in Nashville.
Quoting Burrows..
“It was personal. It started in warmup, before the anthem,” Burrows said of Auger’s penalty calling. “(Auger) came over to me and he said I made him look bad in Nashville on the (Jerred) Smithson hit and he said he was going to get me back tonight.”
Burrows was referring to an incident back in December when the Preds’ Smithson hit Burrows and was given a major penalty for charging and a game misconduct. On Monday night, Burrows said Auger was getting back at him.
“When Smithson hit me from sideways and he (Auger) said, ‘I saw the replay, you had your head up, you weren’t really hurt and you made me look bad so I’m going to get you back tonight,’ and he did, and he cost us two points.
These are some pretty serious allegations, ones that could call the integrity of the whole league itself into question. How is this any different than the NBA referee who was fixing games for betting purposes?
You can bet the NHL spin team will be working overtime to figure out a way to quiet this down, but I can’t help but sit here and think back to all the bad calls I’ve witnessed over the years and wonder…
As a fan of hockey, ignorance was bliss. You could get upset over the poor calls, swear at the TV, but in the back of your mind you always believed that the refereeing was legit. If you can’t have impartial judgement from the refs, than what do you have?
From this point forward there will always be that question nagging at you as you watch what you perceive (fairly or unfairly) to be a blown call; Was there some ulterior motive to this call? Do we need to look at video from the last 10 games this guy refereed for this team to see if there was a slight to his honour by a certain player? This is the slippery slope that could cripple the NHL if it loses credibility with the public. A very slippery slope indeed.
Now lets not be naive, we all know that at the professional level of any sport the refereeing is always in question, (by the fans and media) and a player who exaggerates the seriousness of a hit to create a powerplay for his team must know that the ref will see the replay at some point after the game.
This player should than also know that the ref in question won’t appreciate being made to look the fool, but one would also assume that the ref would understand that the idea of the player was to get the advantage for his team, not to embarrass the referee.
There seems to be an issue with Auger’s ego. What hockey fan pays that much attention to who the referee is? Maybe during the game you notice, or perhaps as the game starts you say “oh no, not So And So tonight” or whatever, but do you really think there’s a bunch of guy’s in some basement, wearing referee stripes and whistles, cheering because Stephane Auger won against Alexander Burrows?
Oh yeah, by the way, wasn’t Burrows named NHL player of the week last week?