Ten Seconds Left: When Taking a Penalty Pays

The NHL has yet to fix a rather obvious problem: sometimes, taking a penalty is the sensible way to win a game.

Suppose a team is defending a one-goal lead with ten seconds remaining. An opposing player receives a pass in front of the net and is about to shoot. A defenceman delivers a two-handed slash to his shins, destroying the scoring opportunity.

Assume the play does not meet the existing criteria for a penalty shot. What does the attacking team receive? A power play lasting whatever remains of those ten seconds.

The defending team has traded a dangerous scoring opportunity for a few seconds of penalty killing. The rule creates an incentive to commit the very foul it is supposed to discourage. That is a moronic result.

After more than a century, you would expect the NHL to have worked this out.

The NFL recognizes the underlying problem. Generally, when an accepted defensive live-ball foul occurs on the final play, the offence may extend the period with an untimed down. There are qualifications, but the principle makes perfect sense: the defending team should not be able to use a foul and the expiration of time to escape a meaningful consequence.

Interestingly, the NHL already recognizes this principle too. It just applies it selectively.

Under Rule 74.4, deliberate illegal substitution—intentionally putting too many players on the ice—results in a penalty shot when the bench minor cannot be served in full because of insufficient playing time or penalties already imposed. The provision also applies at any time in overtime. An ordinary botched line change is another matter.

Under Rule 63.6, deliberately displacing the defending team’s own goal similarly results in a penalty shot when the minor cannot be served in full within regulation, or when the infraction occurs in overtime.

Neither provision requires an empty net.

So the NHL understands that a few seconds of power-play time may be an inadequate response to deliberate misconduct. Why recognize that problem when a player dislodges the net, but leave it unresolved when a deliberate slash destroys a clear scoring opportunity?

Same principle. Different treatment. Bizarro.

The rules should provide a meaningful remedy for these late-game fouls. There are several possibilities:

1. Extend play to allow the unserved portion of the penalty to be played, subject to appropriate rules about when that extension ends.
2. Better still, authorize a penalty shot where the referee determines that a deliberate late-game foul deprived the attacking team of a clear scoring opportunity, even if the existing breakaway criteria are not satisfied.
3. In an exceptional case where a deliberate illegal act plainly prevents an otherwise inevitable goal, permit the referee to award the goal.

The third option is admittedly the most contentious. It should require a very high threshold and be used sparingly. The first two deserve serious consideration.

My preference is the penalty shot. It provides a meaningful scoring opportunity without adding potentially several minutes to the game. The referee already makes comparable judgments under the existing rules.

This has something of the upside-down Heinz ketchup bottle about it. An obvious improvement, sitting there waiting to be noticed.

Here is my pitch to the Rules Committee. I would be suitably awed by even a modest thank-you nod.

And yes, I do have a regular job.

Read my letter to the NHL Rules Committee