BOSTON – While it wasn’t the reason that Boston lost the game, Claude Julien wasn’t too happy about the officiating on Sunday night.
The Bruins bench boss went so far as to call it “a farce” when Zdeno Chara was slapped with an embellishment penalty in Boston’s 4-1 loss to a hot Tampa Bay Lightning team at TD Garden on Sunday night. The call arrived in the second period with the Bolts holding a two point lead, and Ondrej Palat getting his stick caught in the body of Zdeno Chara. Palat’s stick rode up between Chara’s legs before appearing to hit him in the groin area, and the 6-foot-9 Bruins defenseman almost immediately recoiled in pain.
Somehow Palat was called for the hooking penalty, and Chara was also whistled for embellishing the call on a play that might have been mighty uncomfortable for the Bruins captain. It sounded like Chara was equal parts mystified and a little annoyed at the implied nature of the penalty used to label divers, floppers and fake artists.
“That’s not what I’ve been known for, and certainly I wasn’t trying to embellish,” said Chara. “I was trying to move [the stick] and I couldn’t. The referees saw it differently. I don’t necessarily agree with it, but that’s something I have to respect. That’s the call.”
Steven Stamkos drew a penalty shot call on the ensuing 4-on-4 play, and scored on the penalty shot attempt to close things out in the three-goal victory.
So Julien was a little worked up on a play that clearly had an impact in a game that was already going south for the Black and Gold.
“I think that’s two embellishment calls we’ve had so far in the last probably week-and-a-half. The one on [Ryan] Spooner where the guy’s got his stick between his legs and he falls, and that would have put us I think five-on-three. They call [that] embellishment,” said Julien. “Then this one tonight. It’s honestly…it’s a farce.
“You know we’re one of the teams that probably embellishes the least [for calls], in my mind anyway, and we try not to. But there’s a lot way worse in this league than those ones. So it’s disappointing. You know I say it’s a farce because it’s disappointing to say the least.”
If the Bruins are embellishing, then they’re clearly not doing a good enough job with Boston holding strong at 27th in the NHL in power play chances, and just 176 power play opportunities in 62 regular season games.