The first over-time period of Game 1 was winding down, and about to bring a much need breather to the Florida Panthers. For ten minutes the Panthers had endured a relentless onslaught of dangerous Oilers forecheckers and shooters, highlighted by two breakaway shots. Just then, with less than two minutes on the clock, fourth-line Panthers forward Tomas Nosek gathered in the puck deep in his own end and went to move it out of trouble.
Nosek rounded the net and found bull-like Oilers forward Vasily Podkolzin coming at him. As Podkolzin leaned in to make a stickcheck, Nosek lofted the puck up and out of the rink. It sailed over the plexi into the netting. This was about the only way a player was going to get a penalty in a Stanley Cup Final overtime where the referees were loathe to call any kind of infraction.
As Nosek skated to the box in despair and shame, Oilers d-man Jake Walman came up and half-scowled, half-smiled, half-jeered into his face, goading the shaken Nosek, who was about to become Florida’s scapegoat when the Oilers scored on the power play.
Was Walman’s taunting of Nosek too much?
That’s how former Oilers d-man and Spittin’ Chiclets podcaster Ryan Whitney saw it. “He’s played incredible but I didn’t like this,” Whitney said of Walman. “Take the PP and move on. Don’t need to be testing hockey gods/karma with that.”
Added Bill Horosz of the On the Prowl: Florida Panthers Den podcast, “Don’t poke the bear. Too late you already did.”
Others saw Walman’s action in a different light.
On his 32 Thoughts podcast, Sporsnet’s Elliotte Friedman noted Walman and perhaps also Oilers d-man John Klingberg had provoked Nosek. “They made sure to get into Nosek’s space on the way to the penalty box,” Friedman said, noting that this was something players on Toronto and Carolina hadn’t done in the playoffs, never firing back as the bully boys of Florida kicked sand at them.
But Edmonton is a different beast, Friedman said. “Edmonton is making a point of saying, ‘Normally, you guys are the ones who set the physical and verbal tone. You get others you get under other skin. We’re coming at you with this too.’ They’re saying, ‘We’re not letting Florida do all the talking. We’re doing some of the talking here too.’ ”
Veteran ESPN broadcaster John Buccigross also like what he saw in Walman’s taunt, saying, “You win with psychopaths like Jake Walman.”
What Chaos podcaster Pete Blackburn added, “Imagine committing the worst penalty of your life on hockey’s biggest stage and some psychotic TikTok influencer (Walman) immediately does this to you”
And Toronto sports producer Drew Livingstone: “Jake Walman laughing at Tomas Nosek for taking the penalty in overtime is crazy stuff 😂.”
My take
1. Walman raised his profile in Edmonton to the level of folk hero in Game 1 with his fearless shot blocking, disdain for pain, hard hitting and excellent puck moving and play-making, highlighted by his outside shot leading to Edmonton’s first goal.
I didn’t catch this incident with Nosek during the game, but others did and most Oilers fans approved. For example, on the X platform, Oilers fan Bone said, “I find it hilarious how many people are clutching their pearls over this. Obviously none of that crowd have heard what players say to their opposition on literally every mistake they make.”
Added fan Chris Roberts, “You get the same response in beer league hockey at 11 pm on a Tuesday night.”
2. I think Friedman has it right here, and that it’s high time someone stood up to the Panther bullies both physically and verbally. The Oilers have just the nasty bunch to do it, big hitters like Evander Kane, Podkolzin, Trent Frederic and Darnell Nurse, and chirpers and agitators like Kane (again), Corey Perry and, evidently, Walman.
3. I’m sure much worse is said and done off camera in NHL games. This only has our attention because we have a viral video clips of it. In that way, it’s no big deal. And we are, after all, talking about players who regularly try to grind one another into the pulp with hellacious hits. That’s more of a big deal than a chirp or a provocation.
4. At the same time, I also agree with Whitney. There was a vicious edge to what Walman did, hacking on a guy in the worst and likely defining moment of his NHL career.
But note that Whitney wasn’t worried about how Nosek and the Panthers would react, he was worried about the Hockey Gords, about karma.
Perhaps you put no weight in the capricious and fickle Hockey Gords, but players do, hence their high number of superstitions, and many fans do, hence their high number of superstitions also.
I’ve been studying Grade A shots for 15 years. This has made me acutely aware of how the slighest deflection or change in timing changes a Grade A shot into a goal or a goal into a big save.
The puck is round, the ice is slippery and who knows what the hell is going to happen in a game? Luck plays a massive part of it.
I worry about anything that might offend the Hockey Gords (as the late, great Bruce McCurdy called them).
Does Walman’s taunt qualify as something that might affect them? No, going by the evidence and immediate outcome of the game I don’t think so.
After all, the Hockey Gords permitted the guile of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Corey Perry and the supreme talent of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl to capture victory a moment later, bringing justice to the game, as the Oilers had significantly out-played the Panthers for two periods, not to mention Sam Bennett’s antic’s on the first Panther goal and Niko Mikkola’s unpenalized slew foot on McDavid, two acts that I suspect the Hockey Gords frowned upon.
At the Cult of Hockey
LEAVINS: Player grades as Oilers beat Panthers
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