In what has been a completely unpredictable guessing game with what kind of officiating is showing up to every NHL playoff game, the refs might have missed a suspension-worthy offense during the Rangers’ 3-1 loss to the Penguins in their first-round series on Tuesday night at the Garden.
As the Blueshirts went down 2-1 in the best-of-seven contest, they watched as forward Viktor Stalberg was nailed with a stick to his face from Pittsburgh defenseman Kris Letang with 12:45 remaining in the third period. Letang was circling around his own net, battling against the forechecking Dominic Moore, when he saw Stalberg in front of him and swung his stick right into Stalberg’s face.
Stalberg went to the bench and had the trainer look for missing teeth, but no penalty was called and Stalberg didn’t miss a shift.
A similar play from the Blackhawks’ Duncan Keith happened late in the regular season, when he was falling to the ground and swung his stick to hit the Wild’s Charlie Coyle in the face. That earned Keith, a repeat offender, a six-game suspension. Letang has been suspended once before, for boarding back in 2011.
Seems the Rangers are now even on coach’s challenges.
The Blueshirts had a power-play goal from Chris Kreider overturned in the first period, when Pittsburgh coach Mike Sullivan challenged that J.T. Miller had been offside when the puck entered the zone — and he was right.
Miller’s back skate appeared to be off the ice, and the goal was wiped off the board, keeping the game scoreless.
“The purpose of that rule being in place is to get it right,” Rangers coach Alain Vigneault said. “And it was the right call.”
Sullivan had challenged another Rangers goal, the go-ahead tally from Derick Brassard in Game 2, when the Blueshirts center was so tenuously close to being offside. That goal stood, and the Rangers won that game.
As for if it could have been predicted that the challenge would have this much impact, Vigneault said: “Nobody can predict the future and anticipate what’s going to happen.”
Rangers defenseman Dan Girardi stayed on the ice late Tuesday morning, as he remained out with the “whole thing” injury that kept him from playing in Game 2. Vigneault said that Girardi had been skating on his own for “for three, four days” and that Tuesday “was the first time that he had more.”
He’s still technically “day-to-day,” but Vigneault added, “we’ll see how things progress.”
Vigneault recently said that he thinks the veteran right-hander has been “unfairly criticized,” and that when he’s healthy, he’s more than likely to go right back into the lineup.
With the return of captain Ryan McDonagh to the Rangers’ backend, righties Dylan McIlrath and Raphael Diaz were the healthy scratches. McIlrath had played in place of Girardi in Game 2, while Diaz was just recalled on Monday and hasn’t played a game for the Rangers this season.
The scratches up front remained Oscar Lindberg and Marek Hrivik . The taxi squad call-ups from AHL Hartford are expected some time in the next two days, with the Rangers practicing at the Garden on Wednesday afternoon.