John Carlson cannot buy a call from the NHL this season.
In November alone, Carlson has seen three potential goals erased by controversial calls, with his latest washout coming against the New York Islanders on Friday. After Carlson scored what would have been a go-ahead goal with just 5:55 remaining in the second frame, Islanders head coach Patrick Roy challenged the play for goaltender interference.
The claimed interference came from Hendrix Lapierre, who was screening goaltender Semyon Varlamov in the crease. After the shot deflected off an Islanders defender in front, Varlamov appeared to initiate contact with Lapierre before pushing off with his left skate to try and make a save on Carlson. Officials determined that was enough to disqualify Carlson’s goal.
The Capitals have lost every video review for goaltender interference this season, including two goals overturned by opponents’ challenges and one no-goal call upheld after a challenge of their own. When asked about the slew of calls going against them, Capitals head coach Spencer Carbery had plenty to say.
“You want to go into this?” he asked with a grin.
Carbery found little rhyme or reason behind officials’ recent rulings, and he has run out of advice for how his skaters can avoid losing goals to future video reviews.
“Honestly, I don’t tell [my forwards] anything because I don’t know anymore,” he said. “I have no idea. When those decisions are being made, I have zero clue whether it’s going to be goalie interference or not. It’s gotten to a spot that we’re going to have to do something as a league and as a sport and figure out where we’re going.
“Because years ago, [the rule] was: you can’t go anywhere inside of that paint. And then that’s — Brett Hull — and they said, ‘Okay, hold on a second here. We need more goals. We can’t be waving stuff off for guys on the side.’ So, I don’t know. Lappy, to me, doesn’t do anything to affect that goal. It’s a goal whether he’s standing there or not, moves out of the way. So to me, I don’t know the answer, but I just know that that should be a hockey goal.”
Despite his usual affinity for reviewing game tape, Carbery and his staff have all but given up on trying to puzzle out what, exactly, counts as goaltender interference in today’s NHL.
“Whether it’s disallowed or not, you can sit here and beat it up and argue and go, ‘you touched his foot, his leg, his pad,’” he said. “You can sit here all day and debate it, and that’s what — we finally go through all these, we’ll sit there, and I’ve stopped doing it because we’ll waste an hour of our day going back and forth as a staff and going ‘Eh, did he — what was the force there? Let’s measure that. Did he fully extend, or did he just –.’ It’s so arbitrary.”
That frustration has bled over into the Capitals’ on-ice play. The Islanders killed off a penalty and scored twice in the five minutes following the officials’ decision, putting the Caps behind 4-2 after the second period.
“The boys were a little fired up,” said Jakob Chychrun. “It’s happened a lot to us. It’s frustrating, but there’s not much you can do at the end of the day. You’ve just got to keep going.”
Though Carlson did not speak to the media postgame, his teammates acknowledged how Friday’s review must weigh on him after seeing so many goals washed out.
“I think it’s frustrating for our whole group but probably him especially,” Connor McMichael said. “I don’t know if there’s a stat on how many goals called back in one season. He’s gotta be up there, though. He’s playing great. We’ve just got to get out of the blue paint, I guess.”
With little way to decode the calls and tensions building, Carbery believes it’s time for a change.
“I don’t know where it goes, but I do feel like it needs to be way more clear for the players and for the fans and coaches to know what exactly what are we doing here with goalie interference.”