Referee Garrett Rank found himself with a mess on the ice and a quick way to clean it up.
A post-whistle scrum late in Monday’s game saw both teams come together deep in the Florida zone. Ottawa’s Brady Tkachuk took a whack at goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky after the Panthers’ netminder stopped him on a breakaway. The Florida players took offense, swarming Tkachuk, whose teammates quickly joined the fracas.
When the dust settled, referee Garrett Rank relayed the litany of calls on the ice.
“Every player on the ice has a ten minute misconduct,” Rank announced, in addition to minor penalties for roughing and goaltender interference.
Florida lost Oliver Ekman-Larsson, Jonah Gadjovich, Ryan Lomberg, Dmitry Kulikov, and Kevin Stenlund, while the Sens would see Tkachuk, Drake Batherson, Erik Brannstrom, Rourke Chartier, and Travis Hamonic sent to the locker room.
Rank also made more room on the benches when he sent off Florida’s Sam Bennett and Ottawa’s Mathieu Joseph with matching misconducts just two minutes later.
The game finished with a combined 167 penalty minutes – 106 coming at that one stoppage. That’s the highest total this season. The highest last season was 166 — also from Panthers vs. Senators.
Florida Panthers head coach Paul Maurice downplayed the penalty totals.
“Just a hockey game,” Maurice said. “You can’t play light in the game. Both teams want to win. You get a little snarly. That was fun. It’s good.”
“We only got to about 160-some [penalty] minutes there. It’s got to get into the 250s before it gets too squirrelly. Sometimes hockey can get like that. That’s part of why the game’s so darn great because it’s graceful and beautiful and physical and angry all at the same time. It’s probably good for both team. You get to make it part of the story of your year.”
The Panthers went on to win the game 5-0. Referees were Garrett Rank (#7) and Mitch Dunning (#20) with linesmen David Brisebois (#96) and Derek Nansen (#70).
