Boston Bruins Coach Bruce Cassidy Fined After Ripping Officiating, Islanders Following Game 5

Boston Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy can’t be happy with his team dropping each of the last two games to fall behind to the Islanders 3-2 in the series. He’s also not too pleased with how the refs have handled the whole series, or how Islanders coach Barry Trotz called out Patrice Bergeron for ‘cheating’ during faceoffs.

“It’s a very well-respected management and coach staff over there,” Cassidy said via The New York Post. “But they sell a narrative over there that they’re the New York Saints rather than the New York Islanders.”

Cassidy would go on to criticize the officials for favoring the Islanders.

“They just need to be better than that. Just call the game what you see, quit listening to these outside influences, and get it done right,” Cassidy said. “Because I don’t think they were great tonight, I’m not going to lie to you. But they have been, and they’re good officials, I know those two guys — they’re good guys, good officials. I don’t know, tonight I just thought they were off.”

On Tuesday, it was announced that the league would be fining Bruce Cassidy for his comments.

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Bruins head coach Bruce Cassidy has been fined $25,000 for publicly criticizing the officiating of his team’s series against the Islanders.https://t.co/vvSGA0EYPm

— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) June 8, 2021

Bruce Cassidy would stand up for himself after the fine, saying he was more so trying to stand up for his player than call out officials.

“I’m always going to protect my captain,” Cassidy said Tuesday. “Listen, we’re in front of the cameras a lot and the media, it’s an entertainment business. It’s been a good series, so there’s been a little bit of that back and forth. Obviously, I felt there were some calls that didn’t go our way that have gone against us when it comes to high sticks.

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“I was held accountable for it. When you get fined you say something to the effect of ’embarrassing’ or ‘a joke’ and I didn’t say any of that.”

It will certainly be interesting to see if the Islanders still get the majority of penalty calls to go in their favor after the media firestorm. But the Bruins will also have to come out with a dominant performance with their backs against the wall in Game 6.

Bruce Cassidy and the Bruins will hope to pull off the win in New York on Wednesday night in order to force a Game 7 on Friday night.

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