Officiating should not decide the outcome of sporting events. In a contest between two opponents, it should be their abilities and talents, along with whatever luck each one gets, that determines the winner. The officials are there to fairly enforce the rules of the game, to adjudicate matters as fairly and evenly as possible, and to not interject themselves into the game.
The Worcester Railers did not get that from ECHL referee Dominic Cadieux Friday night at the DCU Center. While at many points in the game you could say he wasn’t the reason the Railers were losing, and in fact this writer tweeted just that, by the end of the game Cadieux’s antics were the number one reason the Railers were on the losing end of a 5-4 overtime final against the Cincinnati Cyclones.
Bringing back memories of AHL referee Jeff Smith, who officiated games in the manner of “I have somewhere to be after the game, so let’s just keep that clock running”, referee Cadieux let the teams play. Well, through the second period at least. In the first forty minutes there were plenty of penalties to call, and Cadieux called none of them. He set a call level that essentially said “no blood, no foul”, and that’s how the teams played. Until suddenly in the third period Cadieux remembered there was a rulebook.
Unfortunately, Worcester fans aren’t certain he ever read it.
The third period was so badly one-sidedly officiated that, after a Railers goal was waved off at 16:25 of the period, which we’ll get more into that later, one of the linesmen had to tell Cadieux that he needed to put a Cincy player in the penalty box for the dust-up that followed. Apparently somehow Cadieux didn’t notice the three dark jerseys surrounding Bakanov in the altercation.
There is almost no way to write about the Cyclones’ two-man advantage in overtime without sounding like a raving lunatic, so suffice it to say that the 3:35 played in overtime should be plenty of evidence that Cadieux should never officiate another ECHL game again. Except, of course, he’s the scheduled referee to Saturday’s game.
Getting to the actual game, it was Brendan Robbins who got the Railers on the board first with a nice finish to a three-on-one break.
The Cyclones tied the game at 14:42 on a goal that should have at least been correctly reviewed but instead was allowed because referee Cadieux didn’t review the right thing. He reviewed Cristiano DiGiacinto’s goal for goaltender interference. The issue was the puck was clearly hit with a high stick.
But the goal stood, and it was 1-1 after twenty minutes.
In the second period the Railers, who have started to play some decent hockey and have looked to be close to breaking out many times this season, completely forgot how to play hockey. James Hardie made it 2-1 Cincy ay 8:54 when Worcester could clear the puck and got caught running around their own zone. It was 3-1 at 12:05 when Justin Vaive overpowered Ryan Verrier and was just able to deflect the puck past Henrik Tikkanen.
Jake Pivonka would stop the bleeding with a booming slapshot from the point just as he stepped on the ice in a line change for Robbins.
But that was only temporary as once again Cincy would score when Worcester couldn’t clear the puck, and as the play continued in the Railers end Luka Burzan ended up all alone in front of Tikkanen at 18:42.
It stayed that 4-2 score until deep into the third period when once again Worcester appeared to be on the wrong end of an incorrect video review. After a huge scrum in front of the Cincy net the red light behind Cyclones goaltender Olof Lindbom went on, but referee Cadieux made no signal other than blowing his whistle to stop play. The video shown on the Daktronics board high over center ice clearly showed the puck in the net.
With the call on the ice being “no goal” referee Cadieux went to video review and confirmed his call. The issue for the Railers, and their fans, is he didn’t indicate why it was not a goal despite the puck clearly being in the net. It wasn’t a goal because in the scrum Anthony Callin pushed Lindbom into the net, which allowed the puck to cross the goal line. An easy thing to explain, and ECHL Rule 88.2 says referee Cadieux is required to do so.
Of course, he did not.
In the four on four that followed, Jordan Smotherman pulled Tikkanen for an extra attacker, and despite Aston Calder flubbing the pass to him Connor Welsh was able to blast one in to make it 4-3.
Never before had the Railers scored two extra attacker goals in the same game, but we can cross that factoid off the list as Pivonka connected on his second goal of the game with just 15.3 seconds remaining in regulation.
And once overtime began referee Cadieux turned up the idiocy, and for the sake of this writer’s mental health we’ll just leave it at that.
GAME NOTES
Scratches for the Railers were Christian Krygier (IR/upper), Riley Piercey (day to day/upper), Anthony Repaci (day to day/lower body), and Zach White. Triston Lennox was the backup goaltender. The Railers had their first transaction this season, sending Adam Goodsir to the Iowa Heartlanders to complete the future considerations trade which brought forward Zach White to Worcester on August 14th.
Technically Worcester had a second transaction this week when, according to the ECHL transactions listings, they signed former Worcester Blades netminder Mariah Fujimagari as an emergency back-up goaltender Monday morning and then released her in the afternoon. We’ll be digging into this a bit more as when this writer asked about the signing there were some raised eyebrows from some of the staff. Making a guess here, with Andrei Bakanov not making the trip to Newfoundland due to either passport or visa issues perhaps he needed a goaltender to shoot at as he worked out alone, and Fujimagari was available. Being signed as an EBUG would get her covered by the team’s insurance.
As it’s the first time Worcester and Cincinnati play this season we’ll take a look at some roster and area connections between the team, starting with Cyclones’ defenseman Nicholas Favaro who spent four seasons at Curry College. Forward Jake Gaudet played four seasons at UMass-Amherst, including winning the National Championship in the 2020-21 campaign. Cincy captain Justin Vaive played five games against WorSharks with the Hartford Wolf Pack, going 0-3-3 with a plus-1 rating and two penalty minutes. Cyclones head coach Jason Payne played 11 games for IceCats in the 2000-01 season, racking up 46 penalty minutes.
The three stars of the game were:
1. CIN – 47 Ole Julian Bjorgvik-Holm
2. WOR – 13 Jake Pivonka
3. WOR – 16 Ashton Calder
The 210Sports Player of the Game was Connor Welsh.
Even Strength Lines
Bakanov / Callin / Ryan
Quinlivan / Robbins / Howdeshell
Jenkins / Pivonka / Calder
X / Cipollone / X
Welsh / Cosgrove
Schultz / Verrier
Kulakov / Copeland
Garat
Our affiliates last night
Hershey 5, Bridgeport 4
In the ECHL’s North Division
Adirondack 5, Norfolk 2
Maine 4, Trois-Rivières 2
Reading 4, Newfoundland 3 OT
BOX SCORE
Cincinnati 1 3 0 1 – 5
Worcester 1 1 2 0 – 4
1st Period-1, Worcester, Robbins 3 (Quinlivan, Garat), 7:56. 2, Cincinnati, DiGiacinto 2 (Smereck, Burzan), 14:42. Penalties-No Penalties
2nd Period-3, Cincinnati, Hardie 1 (Lapid), 8:54. 4, Cincinnati, Vaive 5 (Andrusiak, Caporusso), 12:05. 5, Worcester, Pivonka 5 (Kulakov, Howdeshell), 13:45. 6, Cincinnati, Burzan 5 (Pekar), 18:42. Penalties-No Penalties
3rd Period-7, Worcester, Welsh 2 (Cosgrove, Calder), 18:09. 8, Worcester, Pivonka 6 (Jenkins, Calder), 19:44. Penalties-Bakanov Wor (hooking), 4:43; served by Howdeshell Wor (bench – too many men), 9:04; Smereck Cin (roughing), 16:25; Bakanov Wor (roughing), 16:25.
1st OT Period-9, Cincinnati, Bjørgvik-Holm 2 (Andrusiak), 3:55 (PP). Penalties-Bakanov Wor (holding), 1:55; Schultz Wor (cross-checking), 2:33.
Shots on Goal-Cincinnati 12-16-9-6-43. Worcester 12-8-10-0-30.
Power Play Opportunities-Cincinnati 1 / 4; Worcester 0 / 0.
Goalies-Cincinnati, Lindbom 3-2-0-0 (30 shots-26 saves). Worcester, Tikkanen 1-3-1-1 (43 shots-38 saves).
A-2,224
Referees-Dominic Cadieux (3).
Linesmen-Matthew Heinen (93), Maxime Bedard (65).
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