Believe me when I say that we here are all stunned at the fairness of the referees so far this series. This is NOT normal, not even close to normal. My thinking is that maybe the NHL has decided it would make a nice Cinderella ending to the Alex Ovechkin story for him to win a cup and this may be his last chance at it. After all, it makes no sense to put all your eggs in one crybaby basket of Sindy Crosby.
As I stated somewhere earlier in this thread it felt really weird to watch a post season Caps Hens game with fair refs. Very weird indeed.
I did not expect any further action on Wilson's hit on Dumoulin. It was pretty obvious he did not target him and that Dumoulin's own actions led to the hit being what it was. Again, more fair play by the NHL. This one I thought would have been very unfair if they blamed Wilson for it.
If what you [and others] say about the favoritism to the Penguins over the years and your surmising about what the NHL has "perhaps decided" about the way the playoffs would "be nice to go" this year is even remotely true, then what is the point of investing yourself as a fan? Such manipulation would put the NHL only a few steps above pro wrestling.
I will say this: If the Caps were to make it to the finals against the Vikings, IMO they'd be in serious trouble. If there was a game I saw this year where the Caps were clearly outclassed in a way that had nothing to do with individual game motivation, it was the game against Vegas. They seemed to be motivated in that game, but they were struggling to stay in it to the extent they did. I realize it was only one game, and June is not regular season, but boy, those two teams did NOT belong on the same ice.