There were a lot of positives to take from the Edmonton Oilers versus Arizona Coyotes game that saw the Oilers walk into their bye week and the All-Star weekend with a 7-3 victory. Edmonton has to be feeling pretty good about their 6-1-1 record in the month of January and their position as a team right in the hunt for a playoff spot.
That said, not everything from that game was positive. If you ask a lot of Oilers fans (even a lot of fans who don’t support the Oilers), Connor McDavid got completely shafted during that contest. While he still walked away with a couple goals, he also walked away with two more minutes added to his penalty minutes total for the season. The interference call against him cost the Oilers a goal, but fortunately, not the game.
At the time of the call, McDavid was not happy.
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McDavid Got Shafted… Again
Let’s pretend for one second that we can understand how McDavid feels on a nightly basis. It’s one thing to know you’re probably the best hockey player in the world, but with that comes a million should-be penalties against you that don’t get called. If you’re McDavid, you know going into any game, tonight will be another night where you’re likely whacked, held, slashed and hooked and the refs either miss it, don’t call it or aren’t sure when to draw the line because if they called everything, you’d probably draw a penalty every shift. Yet, you don’t show up the refs and you keep leading the league in points.
McDavid rarely gets the favorable call and he rarely argues about it. So, when call sends the most mugged player in the game to the box when he shouldn’t be there, he’s got to be annoyed. When the call is so insanely incorrect because he was already occupying the space the Coyotes player skates into, thus resulting in an interference call against McDavid, no wonder he’s upset.
Does McDavid Need to Whine More?
Arguing likely doesn’t overturn the officials call. That’s not the point. But, saying something gets referees to pay more attention, something that official clearly wasn’t doing on the play.
They say the squeaky wheel often gets the oil. While McDavid never wants to be seen as a player who whines, being more vocal about the assaults against him should be a new year’s resolution for the Oilers captain. Otherwise, as he gets called for penalties that are 50/50 at best, the shafted side of the McDavid ledger is going to look a lot more lopsided.
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