TEMPE, Ariz. — With 25 seconds remaining in regulation Friday, Jakob Chychrun backhanded the puck off the glass from deep in the Arizona end. Chychrun got more on his clear than he would have wanted.
As the puck rolled down the ice, linesman Joe Mahon, standing in the neutral zone, raised his right hand to signal a pending icing. Jeremy Swayman put up his left hand. Derek Forbort, the closest Bruin, skated toward the puck, never adjusting his stride.
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But as the puck approached the crease, Ryan Gibbons, the other linesman, waved his arms to negate the icing. Swayman kept his hand up while Forbort retrieved the puck, which had crossed the goal line by then. But as Forbort started his exit, he lost control of the puck.
Matias Maccelli recovered the puck. He passed to Lawson Crouse at the left circle. Swayman tried to get over, but Crouse hammered the puck past the goalie with 13.5 seconds remaining to give the Coyotes an improbable 4-3 win at Mullett Arena.
“I was shocked,” Nick Foligno said of the waved-off icing. “I actually couldn’t believe it. I didn’t know what was going on. I was almost dumbfounded at that point. Not to knock those guys. It’s just a surprising call when, 100 times out of 100, that’s an icing. I don’t really know the difference.”
After the loss, Swayman was practically speechless.
“Yeah, I do,” Swayman said when asked if he thought it was icing. “But it is what it is. Moving on.”
Had the call been made, the Bruins would have had an offensive-zone faceoff with approximately 17 seconds remaining in regulation. It would have given them a good opportunity to set up a play, most likely with Brad Marchand, Patrice Bergeron and David Pastrnak getting the assignment.
It never happened.
“We thought it should have been icing,” coach Jim Montgomery said.
Instead, the result was what sometimes happens in the NHL: A dominant team walked out with zero points. The Bruins overwhelmed the Coyotes in shots, 46-16. Pastrnak led the charge with 13 attempts, hitting the net with nine. One of them found the back of the net in the first period when the right wing hammered home a power-play one-timer.
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Pastrnak had help. Charlie Coyle scored a net-front goal in the second. With the Bruins trailing 3-2, Foligno one-timed home a David Krejci setup on the power play.
“Shot quality was pretty good, too,” Montgomery said of the Bruins’ sniffs. “I don’t know exactly. I think we had 15 chances in the second. Their goalie played well. The puck was rolling a little bit, so we couldn’t shoot pucks quicker. We need to shoot pucks quicker.”
But Karel Vejmelka stopped 43 shots.
“When we’re playing that well, good things are going to happen for our club,” Foligno said. “It’s a little surprising it didn’t. It was more circumstantial than not. I’m not going to look down on our team tonight. There’s areas we can improve in. Any time you lose, there’s little things you can take away. But you pepper a goalie that many times, we play the way we did, we dominated that team. It’s unfortunate we didn’t come away with the win.”
If the Bruins had a gripe, other than the waved-off icing, it was with the quality of opportunities they gave the Coyotes. Some of that is due to their own attack.
The Bruins are an aggressive offensive team. As such, they are sometimes prone to counterattacks. In the third period, for example, with the score tied 2-2, Pastrnak turned the puck over in the offensive zone. The Coyotes were free to fly. On the following rush, Nick Schmaltz scored a backdoor goal to put the Coyotes ahead.
“That’s something we can take away,” Foligno said. “When you do have the puck that much, there’s just moments you don’t get it in deep, and that’s all they need. That seemed to be the case tonight. That little play where you don’t get it in, they have a little bit of life, and they think they’re in the game. That’s just a little understanding for our group. We’re normally a very good team in understanding circumstances and game management. Tonight, it cost us a little bit. It’s unfortunate.”
(Photo of Coyotes goaltender Karel Vejmelka making a save against Nick Foligno: Ross D. Franklin / Associated Press)
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