The Zapruder Goal Comment Count

Brian

So Michigan won a hockey game last night after a ten minute review that contained more back-and-to-the-left moments than JFK.

At first ESPN put on the overhead cam and that was inconclusive, but my instant reaction when I saw the far endzone cam was "that's in the net." The guy doing the actual game then ran the overhead cam on a loop, and once he did it became clear that a portion of Faulkner's skate well in the net was actually the puck. I was convinced, and eventually so were the refs.

The college hockey internets duly blew up. I kind of figured this would happen. There was no "ah-ha" frame. Everything put together made it incredibly unlikely the puck wasn't in the net, and it's always easier in that situation to just say "sorry, inconclusive."

Complainers are wrong.

goalo

Wrong!

goalo

Wronnnnnnnnnnng!

goalo

And the refs were right. More stills.

If you want to argue that the refs shouldn't have called a goal because you couldn't figure out it was a goal and they could and they were later proven right, you are insane. This is a group that appears to include EJ Hradek and ESPNU's studio talking head, who complained that the spot shadow showing the puck well in the net wasn't available to the refs, thus inflaming the already pretty inflamed college hockey internet.

Why people suddenly want it to be harder to prove a puck was in the net than get convicted for murder in Mississippi I don't know, but I think it has something to do with the wings on the helmets.

UPDATE: Josh Houchin has a video look at it:

That's in the net.

Comments

tk47

March 26th, 2011 at 11:50 AM ^

Here's my question though -- WHY DO WE NOT HAVE IN-NET GOAL CAMS IN THE NCAA TOURNAMENT?  This game was played in a NHL arena, so it's not like it can't handle the technology of a goal-cam or something.

Wolverine318

March 26th, 2011 at 11:54 AM ^

Afreaking men. The WCHA and UNO fans complaining on USCHO and blogs elsewhere have reached an all time high. You would think that we just committed highway robbery, except when high def images clearly shows it was the correct call. Whatever, WCHA fans will always find something to bitch about; unfair seeding, a sub 0.500 wisky team not making the tournament, the refs not giving them every call, etc. I am starting to believe that WCHA fans are worst than SEC fans. God help us if the SECHC ever makes the jump to D1 hockey.

http://sechchockey.com/

namaste

March 27th, 2011 at 12:18 AM ^

Let's not go overboard. In college hockey, WCHA fans are the equivalent of the SEC football fan. Let's not label them as worse...

Is it really that painful for them to root for their own team? Pathetic. I can't wait until Wisconsin and Minnesota leave, and the WCHA loses all credibility as a difficult conference. None of those programs (other than North Dakota) will even have a shot at being a powerhouse anymore.

Ron Swanson

March 26th, 2011 at 11:55 AM ^

I have no doubt that the puck was behind the line.  However, I can undertand the frustration because in the picture the puck looks like it could be hovering directly above the line.  The day may soon come where enhancing the picture will have the puck featured in more than 1 pixel.  

2Blue4You

March 26th, 2011 at 11:58 AM ^

There was a third angle showed only twice that is fron the right side of the blue line and you see that it is Faulkner's right pad that eventually kicks the puck out.  This still shows his left pad w/ the puck under it.  So his right pad which is well in the net kicks the puck out.  From the top cam, you see what you can be pretty sure is the puck and not a skate in the net and then you see the puck clearly coming out of the net w/ some momentum that could not be generated unless the puck was all the way in the net and fully kicked out w/ the right blocker. CONCLUSIVE!

UNO is a kids game, why would you have them sponsor your team?

Blue boy johnson

March 26th, 2011 at 11:59 AM ^

It has nothing to do with winged helmets and has everything to do with being a sore loser. There would have been scores of people acting exactly the same way if the roles were reversed.

M fans are some of the biggest babies on the internet. Blaming the refs is always easier than admitting defeat.

bronxblue

March 26th, 2011 at 5:19 PM ^

I don't blame UNO fans for being pissed - it sucks to lose on a close (correct) play.  But when the ESPNU announcers are goading "experts" to call it a travesty despite overwhelming evidence or bloggers are bitching that the process was the problem, not the result, then those people have no leg to stand on. 

MichiganMan2424

March 26th, 2011 at 8:03 PM ^

Thank you for saying this. It's 100% true. This had nothing to do with "winged helmets", people are complaining because it's a controversial call. If this call had gone against Michigan, where Michigan had lost, every single one of you would be bitching about it, so please, all of you, STFU. It had nothing to do with Michigan being Michigan, it had to do with this being a controversial call. And why am I not surprised that the lead bitch is Brian, after reading his piece on "MANBALL" it doesn't surprise me.

cheesheadwolverine

March 26th, 2011 at 12:04 PM ^

In court if you are seen alone coming out of a room with a gun after someone was murdered in the room, you are assumed to have done it even if no one watched the killing, since there is no other reasonable scenario.  Similarly the way the puck came out of his pads.  Circumstantial evidence is evidence.  And the "officials got it right, but they shouldn't have been able to tell from their camer angles" which is pretty much the only argument anyone will make is silly.  No one will say it wasn't a goal.  Even the people who are angry.

GCS

March 26th, 2011 at 12:05 PM ^

 Why people suddenly want it to be harder to prove a puck was in the net than get convicted for murder in Mississippi I don't know, but I think it has something to do with the wings on the helmets.

I'd say it's 50% helmets, 50% some people like to complain about everything.

BlockM

March 26th, 2011 at 12:06 PM ^

So what if I've got a knife in my hand, blood all over my shirt, and you have video of me walking into an empty room with one other person and walking out alone as blood flows out of the doorway. You didn't see me do it. I'm innocent.

kevin holt

March 26th, 2011 at 1:16 PM ^

Could have been a suicide. Lawyer'd.

But seriously, there are angles that show it in the net. This analogy holds if you have a camera that can see through a crack in the door and see shadows of one person stabbing another. Then UNO fans say "well you can't be sure which person was the stabber and which was the stabbee TECHNICALLY" but you know obviously.

wile_e8

March 26th, 2011 at 12:07 PM ^

who complained that the spot shadow showing the puck well in the net wasn't available to the refs

This is especially stupid since the broadcast (at least the one on Altitude) had a camera over the refs shoulder for pretty much the entire review, showing them using every available angle, including the conclusive angle from the far end. Nothing like making up imaginary rules in order to blame the refs for blowing the game by making the correct call.

Jeffy Fresh

March 26th, 2011 at 12:11 PM ^

Why is it that when calls are instantly obvious on the replay when I watch it at home, the fuckfaces with the microphones can never see it correctly?  It happens in all sports, but I notice it mostly in college football, the announcers can't call a replay worth a dick.  Do they have shitty monitors?  Do they have shitty brains?  It never fails.

saveferris

March 26th, 2011 at 12:21 PM ^

When the guys in the ESPNU studio were interviewing the Director of Officials, Steve Piotrowski postgame, pressing him for the "indisputable evidence" that Piotrowski kept talking around the question. 

Of course, the cynic would say that there's no love lost between Michigan / Red and Piotrowski.

ecormany

March 26th, 2011 at 12:19 PM ^

i'm surprised they gave us the goal.  but the end zone cam was conclusive.

if that puck isn't flush on the ice, it's magically hovering 6 inches above the goal line, perfectly flat.  and then somehow continued to levitate forwards in a perfectly smooth motion.  white space = lateral space, not vertical space, and it's a goal.

complainers aren't just wrong, they hate physics.

(one thing i was confused by: they blew the play dead to go to review. is that a rule change? i thought they had to wait until the next whistle, even if like in that very uncomfortable review scenario last year where the puck went through the net, it meant letting them play for several more minutes and giving the other team the chance of putting the puck in the net and [wrongly!] thinking they won the game.)

Don

March 26th, 2011 at 12:51 PM ^

than any other program; the officiating is as bad or good over time for everybody. However, I think it's really naive to think that there isn't a large component of anti-UM bias in the bitching by other fans when the call goes against them in our favor.

GCS

March 26th, 2011 at 1:09 PM ^

FWIW, I DVR'd the replay on ESPNU and was watching it this morning. My wife (Purdue grad school, St. Norberts undergrad, somewhat angry that they are showing the Michigan game tonight instead of the D3 championship game her Green Knights are involved in, as much as a neutral party as I'm going to find) wonders why there is even a controversy. It was clearly in, according to her, when you look at the end zone view.

Add another point in favor of the "it has to do with the wings on the helmet" side.

MaizeNBlueJ

March 26th, 2011 at 1:12 PM ^

Here's the HD broadcast from ESPNU, with some custom editing in Vegas Pro, zooming in on the next when they're running the video in slow-mo:

I recommend opening it on youtube and playing full screen 720P for the full effect.

kevin holt

March 26th, 2011 at 1:22 PM ^

Even if we could only look at the top angle (which was a stupid rule), you can see the puck appear between his skates around :42-:44. There is a white open space between his skates at first. Unless there is a mouse running around on the ice, something called "the puck" pokes its little head out in that space. Then, he pushes it forward and you see the puck come out the front of the net in exactly the same path that his skates push the USO (Unidentified Scored Object).

It's a goal, so stop calling it "inconclusive" and "controversial," everyone on the internet

lhglrkwg

March 26th, 2011 at 1:49 PM ^

that puck is IN THE NET. indisputable. especially right after the flash bulb it is so obvious. how anyone can watch that and say it wasnt indisputable is really digging for something to complain about. i guess we're fortunate wcha-internet-trolls arent reffing out games

AnthonyThomas

March 26th, 2011 at 1:24 PM ^

What I don't understand is when watching the overhead angle, by the way the puck reacts and where the goalie's pads are in relation to the goal line, it would have been physically impossible for the puck to not cross the goal line. I would think the laws of pyhsics would trump all other evidence or lack there of.

CompleteLunacy

March 26th, 2011 at 3:01 PM ^

"There's a chance" the puck was hovering, like a one-in-a-million chance. Even though the evidence is more than overwhelming to the contrary, and knowledge of simple physics dictates that the puck can't just magically hover upward off the ice without flipping (well, it CAN, but it would have to hit a bump in the ice, not a divot!). It's like calling a player out of bounds in football when seeing his foot on the white line on replay, then saying "well, there was a CHANCE his foot was hoveing off the grass an inch at that point, so therefore it's inconclusive". Inconclusive my ass.

It's really grasping at straws, the weakest possible argument. Not even denying it was a goal, denying that the PROCESS was wrong. So they're basically saying that the process SHOULD be flawed and that it SHOULD have been a wrong call. That's Notre Dame logic right there! 

 What would they say if their team got that goal? Probably exactly what we're saying. I know I would say "it's really close, but I'm pretty sure they got the call right" That white space from teh far ice camera angle is damning evidence.

 

Buzz

March 26th, 2011 at 4:46 PM ^

I live in STL, so this was a big treat for me.  I was sitting to the left of the band, one section over, and people at that end of the arena clearly saw the puck cross the line, because the M fans started to go nuts. You can kind of see that on this clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bnkle8bTlHM  People started to jump up as Lynch is pointing at the net.

You can't see it on this clip, but the ref that was behind the net clearly saw it go in, because after the play stopped, he skated over to the ref in front of the net and nodded to him like, " I saw it go in".  Now, Scottrade Center (assholes) didn't replay the damn thing in the arena, so I wasn't sure what the deal was.  I mean, it was a bang-bang play, but it clearly crossed the line from our angle.

zlionsfan

March 27th, 2011 at 1:04 AM ^

I seem to recall being at NCAA men's basketball games and waiting restlessly while a giant NCAA logo filled the screens ... I guess they figure if they showed us what actually happened and the refs get it wrong, we might react poorly. (How this is different from not showing us what happened and the refs getting it wrong, I don't know. I don't think I ever met someone who said "Well, I would have yelled at the refs, but I didn't see a replay, so maybe I was wrong.")

kcutshall

March 28th, 2011 at 8:40 PM ^

First off, thanks for posting a good quality video. I've been looking for one for a couple days. Seccondly, I am a UNO student and a huge Maverick hockey fan. BUT I appreciate good hockey and Michigan played a great game. They deserved the win and I'm glad they are going to the frozen four. In fact, I am now routing for the wolverines (mainly because if you win, UNO looks better).

So now to the real point of this comment.  I could tell about 2 minutes into the replay coverage it was a goal. Any one who says it wasn't is just ignorant.  It's tough to lose to an ugly goal in OT, but I would rather lose from a correct call than win to a wrong one. I'm glad the officials took the time to get it right and the wolverines got the goal and the win they deserved.

See, not all UNO fans are stupid.

FOR THE REST OF THIS SEASON, GO WOLVERINES!

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