Oilers’ Renney toting lighter wallet
Written on the white board in the Edmonton Oilers’ dressing room Wednesday: Team meeting 11:50.
Hopefully, the players were deciding to take up a collection to pay their coach Tom Renney’s $10,000 fine for standing up for them and complaining about the work of the referees in Los Angeles on Tuesday.
That’s chump change for NHL players.
Say $500 a man, although Linus Omark might put up his hand and say “I’ll pay it all.”
Hey, anything to get back into the lineup for Thursday’s game against the Anaheim Ducks at Rexall Place.
“We should have a donation,” said Oilers defenceman Ryan Whitney, after practice.
When asked about some of the non-calls Thursday, Renney said, “Maybe you need Hollywood in the playo s.”
If he’d known he was going to get 10 grand out of his wallet for that, he might have fired both barrels at referees Mike Leggo and Tim Peel, two experienced o cial who didn’t have a good night on the job. In any event, Renney, who has a very good reputation with zebras because he doesn’t chirp from the bench, stayed pretty quiet Wednesday.
“How many fines had you had from the NHL?” Renney was asked. “Zero,” said Renney. So would he like to talk one more time about the fine?
“I’d really like to comment on that,” he said, letting the thought drift away.
No sense digging a deeper hole.
How about if the Oilers players chip in and help him out?
“I’d like to comment on that, too,” he said, smiling broadly.
Renney has pretty much been a model of decorum throughout his coaching days.
“I’ve thought of throwing water bottles and sticks but I’ve never gone there,” he said, admitting he stood on the dasher to yell at the referees in the past.
“My first year coaching in Vancouver I ripped into a ref. Dougie Maclean did the same thing from his bench and I got the warning and the severe reprimand. Dougie got nothing. Welcome to the league,” he said, chuckling.
Over the years, former Oilers coaches Pat Quinn and Craig Mactavish have also been fined $10,000 for questioning the integrity of referees. Quinn was unhappy that Sheldon Souray had been spilled into the end boards by Jarome Iginla, with Souray getting a concussion; Mactavish ripped Mick McGeough after he said Shawn Horco had made a hand-pass o a faceo that wiped out a goal, a mistake Mcgeough, now a supervisor of o cials, absolutely owned up to later.
It could be worse. John Tortorella, who has a much shorter fuse, got fined $30,000 in January for ripping refs Ian Walsh and Dennis Larue for their work in the Winter Classic.
“Two good referees, but the game was re ed horribly. I’m not sure if NBC got together with the referees. Maybe they wanted to get it to overtime,” said Tortorella, who apologized profusely after he got docked.
Just the other day, Philadelphia Flyers coach Peter Laviolette was fined $10,000 for standing on the ledge of the bench to yell at Pittsburgh Penguins assistant coach Tony Granato, who took a $2,500 hit in the aftermath of some shenanigans late in the game.
Oilers captain Horco was taken aback by the fine to Renney.
“Ten thousand is a little harsh for what he (Renney) said,” said Horcoff. “I agree with him. We had some tough calls not go our way … I hope when we’re fighting for the playo s and home ice, the calls go our way. It is what is, it’s only one game.”
“Obviously, as a player, when a coach sticks up for you and shows that kind of passion, you have to make sure next game to show the same passion,” said Oilers centre Sam Gagner.
The Oilers, who have the puck a lot with Ryan NugentHopkins, Jordan Eberle, Taylor Hall, Ales Hemsky and Gagner, have only had 259 power plays. Twelve teams have had fewer calls. In the last month or so, the power-play opportunities for the NHL’S second-best PP have dried up.
Nugent-hopkins was clipped in the head by Willie Mitchell with no penalty call. Colten Teubert dove to knock the puck o the stick of Dustin Brown and got a penalty. Justin Williams spilled goalie Devan Dubnyk behind the net as he played the puck.
That could have been a penalty, too.
“I’ll let it go. It’s over. We had a four-minute power play, too (on a Trevor Lewis high-stick). And we didn’t do a lot with it,” said Renney.