Stanley Cup Final 2012: Refs Decide It’s Time for Kings to Win

It seems like, in the most important games of the top league for a sport, you'd have competent refs. Of course, in all sports, we've seen this to not be the case. But it's never been clearer than these Stanley Cup Finals.

The refs have been godawful. They have missed countless offsides and interferences, and tonight they decided who won the Stanley Cup.

Early in the game, Steve Bernier was given a five-minute major for boarding Rob Scuderi. I do not have an issue with that call.

The issue I have is that mere seconds prior, Jarret Stoll boarded Stephen Gionta in exceedingly similar fashion. If there had been glass, Gionta's face would have been just as cut up as Scuderi's.

As the play was winding down (once the delayed penalty had been called), Stoll decided to wildly throw a punch at the face of a Devil who was trying to stick check him.

Guess how many penalties were called against the Kings?

And now, with a full, uninterrupted five-minute major, the Kings have scored three goals and all but secured their Cup.

The reffing has not entirely been one-sided. There have been missed goalie interferences against the Devils and missed hookings and tripping for both teams. But there have also been some pretty bogus moves against the Devils as well. In four of the first five games, a Devil was high-sticked without a call (once drawing blood). It would be less troubling if the refs weren't so eager to call high-sticking on the Devils.

In Game 4, less than a minute after the Devils took their first lead of the series, the refs called the softest penalty of the playoffs on David Clarkson, and, sure enough, the game was evened up. The refs seem to have become especially adept at sapping a team's momentum.

The Kings won the first three games, and they earned those wins. Sure, the first goal in the third game shouldn't have counted, but they scored three more anyway.

It is ...

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