The Golden Knights didn’t make any secret of their feelings after going down 2-0 in their second-round series to the Oilers on Thursday.
Vegas was furious over referee Gord Dwyer’s failure to call a tripping penalty on Viktor Arvidsson just 17 seconds prior to Leon Draisaitl’s overtime winner.
Defenseman Brayden McNabb fell into the boards shoulder-first after Arvidsson’s stick got between his legs deep into overtime, but Dwyer’s hand stayed down. McNabb left the game injured and shortly thereafter, Draisaitl converted a 2-on-1 feed from Connor McDavid for a 5-4 Edmonton win.
“Listen, Gord’s looking at it. He blew the call. He missed the call,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy told reporters. “I don’t know what else to say. It’s a can-opener trip, it’s a dangerous play, it’s all those things. But it didn’t get called, so you gotta keep playing.”
Cassidy had no update on McNabb’s status for Game 3, which is Saturday in Edmonton.
Losing the top-pair defenseman would make it a double-whammy for Vegas, which is on its heels after losing the first two games of the series at home.
“It’s pretty clear it’s a penalty,” Vegas captain Mark Stone told reporters. “His stick is between McNabb’s legs and he sends him headfirst into the boards. It’s a pretty clear-cut penalty in my eyes and I think everybody’s eyes, right? But that’s hockey. You don’t always get the calls.”
Vegas appeared to have momentum in overtime after killing off a five-minute major on Nicolas Roy’s cross-check to Trent Frederic’s face.
Edmonton netminder Calvin Pickard, however, denied a pair of chances in the game’s last 30 seconds before McDavid blew past Jack Eichel in transition to set up Draisaitl.