Colin Campbell, the NHL’s executive vice president and director of hockey operations, felt that the process that resulted in Matthew Knies’ goal being disallowed during Wednesday’s game against the Washington Capitals should have gone slightly differently.
Knies appeared to make contact with a Morgan Rielly shot well below the cross-bar, but the league disagreed and disallowed the goal immediately, then upheld the controversial decision upon review. Toronto recorded a 4-3 comeback victory in overtime, in large part due to Knies’ all-around efforts.
During an appearance on Leafs Morning Take, the recent Hockey Hall of Fame inductee was asked about how the NHL reviews questionable goals. Campbell explained that it is up to his department to make the call to stop the game so that they can review the play further.
“We’re looking at it, we’re trying to get all the views, and of course, we’re hoping that whoever’s doing the game, sends us more views. We’re trying to get as many as we can,” Campbell said. “We show it to the referee and we ask him what he saw in real-life 3D vision. You get different camera views of it and they tell you a different story. Truth be known, we would have liked them to call that one good goal and then prove that it wasn’t. But they see it once and they allowed it and so we bring them over and they said ‘You’d see enough here to disallow it?’ We let them have good input on that. We make the final call in Toronto.”
Campbell later added that is aware of the calls for the officiating and video review to get the calls to be as consistent as possible and he stressed that they try their best to maintain as much consistency in their decision-making.
It is certainly refreshing to get some insight into what goes on in the process behind plays that get the video review treatment and some transparency into what factors into their decisions. Of course, it may not be fully satisfactory to portions of hockey fans who may demand more but getting a peak behind the curtain goes a long way in helping people better understand the operations and why certain goals are allowed and others aren’t.
Wednesday’s game certainly got Campbell’s department busy as they were tasked with reviewing four different plays, three of which were goals. The other three plays reviewed were certainly up for interpretation as to whether they made the right call, or if the interpretation of the rule needs to be altered. There were also plenty of people griping about the amount of time each review took before the league and the officials reached their decision, with most of them taking well over two minutes to determine.
At the end of the day, the most important thing is that they get as many calls correct as possible, maintain a level of consistency, and are transparent about why they made their verdicts. It is therefore appreciated by Campbell to provide that insight for fans to better understand how the NHL operates with reviewing plays such as Knies’ disallowed goal.
You can watch the full interview with Campbell below:
