Caps/Pens Officiating Awful, Should NHL be embarassed?

Cap GM George McPhee complained outwardly today about the officiating in last night’s 3-2 loss to the Pens.  

“I was disappointed with the officiating last night,” McPhee said
this morning. “I agree with Bruce. One team gets seven power plays and
the other team gets two; it’s hard to win that game. Your defense is
tired, your role players are tired from killing penalties all night,
and your top players don’t get on the ice as much as they’d like to.”

“Some penalties you deserve, and some of them shouldn’t be called in an NHL playoff game,” McPhee said.

He added: “They just don’t protect this goaltender. He got punched
in the head in the first series [by Sean Avery] and cross-checked a
couple of games ago. Malkin ran over him last night, and [Varlamov]
gives them a flick of the stick and we get a penalty. It’s not right.
Those aren’t slashes. Those aren’t things you call in NHL playoff
games.”

McPhee is right.  This is suppose to be the premier series, the Ovechkin/Crosby bull crap the NHL likes to spew, yet the officiating was horrific. 

BUT, is it really that hard to understand.  Gary Bettman and the office in Toronto have a problem.  They built this series up to be the premier series, Caps take a 2-0 lead, NHL can’t be happy with that.  7 penalties on the Caps, just 2 on the Pens?  Yeah ok.  The Pens had more penalties than 2, they just weren’t called.  Facts are facts.  NHL likely wants a close series, go as far to 7 games as you can.

Given that, this is not an excuse for the Caps loss.  Pens outplayed the Caps, period.  All three periods, the Caps were simply out played.  I am not even sure the Caps showed up in Pittsburgh last night.  They were out skated, out played, out hit, out everything. Pittsburgh deserved to win last night.

BUT, that doesn’t excuse the poor officiating.  Whether it was simple incompetence or whether it was Toronto ordered, the refereeing was awful and Gary Bettman should be embarrassed.    Then again, whether it is putting franchises in places like Phoenix or  poor officiating that has gone uncorrected the criticisms of Bettman are loud, well known, and very clear. 

So Donald Brashear gets 6 games (which a suspension was probably deserved, but 6 games?????) and  Chris Kunitz gets none for hitting a goalie in the throat.  Real good Bettman, real good.

It all goes back to what everyone already knows, Bettman, you suck.