Can Toronto Still Be Considered A Hockey City After Celebrating This Non-Goal So Excessively?
We in the biz have a name for this sort of thing. It’s called a mommy goal when the puck ends up on the side of the net. Now I’m sure that in 2018 it’s illegal to call something a mommy goal instead of something more neutral like “parent goal” but that’s not the point. The fact of the matter is that there are very few things more embarrassing than celebrating a non-goal. Typically it’s just the moms in the crowd and perhaps one player on the ice. But this incident from last night? Well this is a pretty terrible look for the entire city of Toronto.
Not only did Hyman and Leivo celebrate like the boys just scored the overtime game winner in game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final, but the goal judge hit the horn and it sounded like the roof was blown off Scotiabank Arena with all the fans going wild for a puck that was on the side of the net. Just look at all of those hands in the air.
Everybody is up out of their seats, high-fiving each other and the ref still hasn’t made any sort of signal. What is especially bad is the group of fans directly behind the net who are celebrating. Because out of everybody there in the barn, they would have had the best view of this puck clearly sitting on top of the net.
Now maybe the worst offender out of everyone are the refs who then whistled this play dead as the Flames were skating down on an empty net. Fortunately the Flames scored on the empty net about a minute later but could you imagine if the refs had blown this play dead and then the Maple Leafs ended up scoring off the next faceoff? All because Toronto–the self-proclaimed center of the hockey universe–couldn’t tell that the puck was on the side of the net? What a black eye on the league that would have been. Luckily the puck never lies and none of that matters right now. But still. Clean it up, TO.