Another sweet “W” on the board for the Dallas Stars, and this time they were not about to let the Avalanche crash their party! After getting blanked 4-0 in Game 4, where Gabriel Landeskog made a Cinderella comeback and slapped home his first goal in nearly three years, Dallas came back with pure fire in their skates. They shook off that rough shutout loss like it was just dust on their jersey, smashing their way to a 5-2 win in Game 5.

Meanwhile, Dallas is just skating on with that 3-2 series lead, while Avalanche fans are left throwing side-eyes harder than slap shots. But, hold up, it wasn’t the big dub that had fans buzzing all over the place. Nope — the real tea was all about the refs letting Dallas’s aggressive plays slide right under the radar.

B/R Open Ice lit up X with a wild clip that had the whole hockey world clutching their pearls—Dallas Stars’ Roope Hintz straight-up smacked Avalanche’s Nathan MacKinnon right across the neck with his stick. Like, full-on whack — and guess what? The refs just stood there like they were watching a magic trick. No call, no whistle, nothing. They captioned it, “Hintz cross-checked MacKinnon and DIDN’T get a penalty,” and, boy, the fans flew into the comments like bees at a barbecue.

One fan dropped the mic with, “Cross checked him on his brain stem, yet no call! 😬” Honestly, at this point, it doesn’t matter if you’re team Dallas Stars, team Avs, or team Chaos—everybody’s united in the sacred hockey tradition of roasting the refs when things get sketchy.

And just when you thought the ref drama couldn’t crank any higher, Aaron Ekblad over at Panthers vs Lightning said, ‘Hold my stick.’ As Florida snagged a 4-2 dub to stretch their series lead to 3-1, Ekblad decided to add a little WWE flavor, dropping a mighty elbow to Brandon Hagel’s head in the second period — and again, no penalty. Fans were losing it harder than a puck in a snowstorm. Even ESPN’s P.K. Subban couldn’t help but crack up, posting, “Dude, look where the ref is. The fans are going to want to hang that guy upside down,” calling it exactly what it was — “a headshot.” But this was just the tip of the iceberg!

Dallas Stars’ player gets spared by the refs!

Another user jumped into the chaos, tossing in, “should have been another interference penalty, but hey go on.” And yep, that pretty much summed up the mood. A few days ago, on one side, you had a team riding the legend wave of a captain who just broke into the mythical 900-goal club. On the other, a young, hungry Montreal squad trying to prove that rebuilding with fresh firepower can actually work. Sounds dreamy on paper, right? But real quick—it turned messy. What fans expected to be a firecracker series turned into a whistle-shy rollercoaster. Especially in Game 2, when Cole Caufield, the Habs’ spark plug, got cross-checked right in the face by Connor McMichael. No call. Nada. And Caufield? Fuming. Dude was banging the glass in full disbelief. Sportsnet even posted, “Cole Caufield is furious after a missed cross-checking call late in Game 2.”

Then there was that overtime moment in Game 1. Picture this: 2–2, extra minutes, tension so thick you could skate on it. Patrik Laine’s ready to play the puck—boom, taken down by Nicolas Roy. And what do the refs do? Blow it dead for icing. Icing?! Fans were like, wait what? Where’s the interference call? And before anyone could blink, Washington scored off the faceoff. Fans, at that point, had seen enough. So when someone said, “Refs just enjoying the view tonight,” it honestly didn’t even sound like sarcasm anymore—it sounded like the painful truth.

Another user didn’t hold back, tossing out, “Nah. Replace refs with robots at this point, or have refs call the penalties from the stands at this point.” And honestly? After Game 3’s total meltdown between the Caps and Habs, it’s kinda hard to argue. We’re talking goalies dropping like flies, benches emptying like it was WWE on ice, and Ovi storming around like he was about to throw thunder with his bare hands. The second Tom Wilson and Josh Anderson locked eyes, you knew it was about to go off. And once Anderson got yanked into a fight via the Caps’ bench door? Yeah, that wasn’t just a hockey game—it was full-on rink warfare.

The NHL wasn’t having it either. TVA’s Renaud Lavoie hopped on X with the classic “The NHL told management of the Canadiens and the Capitals to be more careful during warmups, tv timeouts and after the end of a period. League didn’t like the incidents that happened during last game.” But right when you thought things might chill? Boom—Ovi lays a monster hit on Jake Evans way after the puck was gone. Refs finally decide to grow a spine and slap him with interference. B/R Open Ice posted, “Ovi is called for interference after a huge hit on Evans, and he is not happy about the call.” And yep, the man was heated. Fans were still buzzing over his bulldozer moment with Caufield earlier—“Ovi knocks Caufield down” had the timeline in flames. So when someone let loose with, “cross checked his f*cking neck and the refs don’t say a word,” it kinda summed up the whole vibe.