Hockey East Ref Corsi Espisode III

It is the best time of year in Hockey East. The weather is warming up, playoff hockey is starting and I get to write my annual recap of the officiating in the league. As I displayed last year, I am capable of saying nice things about the refs when they deserve it. Now, before I get into the numbers aka ref corsi, I will be the first to acknowledge the flaws in how I track the numbers and rank the refs. The only numbers available are the refs who work the games and the total number of penalties called so that is all that I have to work with. This obviously penalizes refs who get a game with a line brawl or paired with Kevin Shea when he gets BU a ref who happens to have an off night and try to make the game about him. I will be the first to acknowledge that the refs have a tough job and it is impossible to placate all the fans or even all the coaches but overall they do a pretty good job. Last year, I  they called the second least amount of penalty minutes of any conference so they obviously aren't too bad.

This is the second straight year BU was called for more penalty minutes than their opponent. They had 47 more penalty minutes this year(384-337) as opposed to only 23 more penalty minutes than their opponents last year. This is most likely a result of Jordan Greenway being on the roster and getting called for the Gryba "too big" bullshit penalties. Basically the refs feel bad when big guys physically dominate their opponents and call more penalties on them because of it. I'm not saying the refs purposefully are calling more penalties on Greenway than he deserves but they definitely are calling penalties on him due to his size and the fact that other teams hate him for embarrassing them.

 The average throughout Hockey East regular season home games this year was 22.63 pms/game. This is up 2.53 penalty minutes/game but still down 1 penalty minute from the 2013-2014 season. Now to the rankings...

The refs are ranked from most penalty minutes to the least so the lower the better unless you like watching special teams all game like a savage. These are the 19 refs who got 10 or more games hosted by HE teams this season

1. Cameron Voss- 29.1 pms/game, 19 games, +5.1(25 games)- Voss leads the league in penalty minutes called for the second year in a row which certainly isn't a good look but he helped make this play possible so he is okay in my book.

2. Terrence Murphy- 28.5 pms/game, 28 games,  +5.13(30 games)- I have made my fair share of complaints regarding Murphy this year. The numbers back up my complaints. He calls too many penalties in general as this is his second straight year in the two spot. He is the maine hockey of officials and that's not a good thing.

3. Michael Baker- 28.1 pms/game, 14 games,  No data- This is Baker's first year with enough games reffed to qualify for the prestigious ref corsi rankings. He may wish he did not qualify before this is too high on the list to be happy with your performance.

4.  Geoff Miller-  27.4 pms/game, 18 games, +8.5(18 games)-Miller is another name that you have heard me complain about if you follow along on Twitter. There are many nights when I felt he had room for improvement in that he called too many penalties that just didn't need to be called on both sides. This happened as recently as Friday's game against UMass. I will give him some credit as I thought him and Shea called a great game during the Beanpot championship. With that said, he had the biggest increase in penalty minutes called in the league and that's just not good for the game in my opinion. Less is more when it comes to officiating. Keep control of the game without calling every little thing.

5.  Peter Schlittenhardt- 25.4 pms/game, 22 games, No data- First year doing enough games to qualify. Too many penalties called still and his name is too long. Besides that, he is golden though.

6.  John Gravalese- 23.8 pms/game, 20 games, +5.6(22 games)- I go up and down on Grav every year. Some games I love him and some games he drives me nuts. He certainly called more penalties this year but it seems like he just got more games with majors in them because I doubt he is changing that much as a ref in his like 100th year.

7. Tim Benedetto- 23.7 pms/game, 20 games, +3.0(22 games)- Numbers are up for my boy Timmy but I rope him into the category of Grav where he has been doing this so long that I doubt the way he calls the game is changing too much.

8. Kevin Keenan- 22.9 pms/game, 26 games, +2.4(26 games)- Don't really remember Keenan doing many BU games and he is right about the league average. It makes sense as he has also been around a while in the conference. Doesn't seem like a coincidence that the more veteran officials are right in the middle of the pack for the most part.

9.  Jack Millea- 22.6 pms/game, 27 games +1.7(30 games)- Jack is a big fan of this yearly post so I can't hammer him too hard(not that I would anyway). I wouldn't have much to criticize this year  besides that he gave Ahti Oksanen a misconduct the other night against UMass which Ahti probably said something to deserve but still Ahti is the man. If there was a list of refs with swag, Millea would be near if not at the tops of the list.

10. Thomas Fryer-  22.1 pms/game, 21 games +0.1(21 games)- I have no reaction positive or negative to Fryer which makes sense with him being right around the middle of the pack and the league average two years in a row.

11. Jamie Koharski- 21.8 pms/game, 20 games, no data- I always thought Koharski called a fair game and have had heard other fans say similar things so he must be doing a good job. Usually it's good news if he gets your team's game.

12.  Scott Hansen- 21. 8 pms/game, 23 games, +1.4(26 games)- Hansen calls a ton of games typically and while he didn't call as many this year he still did a fairly good job in the ones that I saw.

13. Kevin Shea- 20.7 pms/game, 25 games, -1.1(23 games)- Who would have guess that one of four refs to have their average go down would be Kevin Shea. I have had a number of strong disagreements with Shea and by disagreements I just mean me bitching and whining on twitter. He seems to be a pretty good ref outside of BU games so I will give him credit for that and for the Beanpot Championship game he called.

14. Tim Low- 20.1 pms/game, 17 games, +1.6(13 games)- Low's numbers went up a bit this year but he still remains the average and the head bobbing he does when comes out on the ice each period is on point so props to him for that.

15. Cameron Lynch- 17.9 pms/game, 10 games, No data- Never heard of him besides the stats here so good for him for doing his job well.

16. Jon Bunyon- 17.3 pms/ game, 29 games, -.7(25 games)- Another shocker is Bunyon being near the bottom of the league in penalty minutes called for a second straight season. I always hated him for tossing Parker one game against Maine a few years ago but he seems to have learned from that and is now a pretty good ref.

17. Thomas Quinn- 17.2 pms/game, 13 games, -2.6 games(8 games)- Anyone with the last name Quinn is a winner. That's just a fact. Give the man more games!

18. Andy O'Brien-15.2 pms/game, 10 games, No data

18. Chris Federico-15.2 pms/game, 10 games, -2.8 (4 games)

Lineys
1. Chris Millea- He has the swag for days. He is the first one in there to break up the scuffles. He battles through injuries to return to action. Great twitter game. What can't he do?!
2. Everybody else

The co-champions this year only did 10 games each so it is tough to tell how good they really are. They did a good job when they got the nod it appears though.

That is it for this year's edition of Hockey East Ref Corsi. Hopefully you learned something or just laughed at how I have no life.  Also, you're welcome Dan Schacte for doing your HW for you.