Accidental Bump or Intentional Shove? You Make the Call

An incident between a Junior A player and referee Saturday night in the BCHL has gone viral on the internet. Near the end of the game between the Chilliwack Chiefs and Surrey Eagles, Latrell Charleston of Surrey was chasing down a puck to negate a potential icing. As the linesman was waving off the icing, Charleston can be seen running over referee Kirk Wood from behind into the boards.

Wood’s head can be seen snapping back as he flies towards the boards. This isn’t the first incident between a player and referee in the BCHL this year as Charlie Zuccarini of the Trail Smoke Eaters was suspended for the rest of the season after slashing a referee after a collision last month.

Charleston was assessed a game misconduct as the final horn blew. As of Tuesday no other penalty has been given.

Charleston took to social media to apologize and to give his side of the story. From his @latrellmc twitter account, Charleston went on to say that it wasn’t intentional and he didn’t mean to hurt [Wood]. He also said that he apologized after the game and they shook hands.

What I didn’t like about his series of tweets is that he didn’t take any accountability for it. It’s easy to commentate from behind a computer or in the stands compared to on the ice but Charleston has to do better to play the puck and not run over a helpless official. Do referee’s get in the way despite trying to stay out of play? Sure. But if there’s anyone you don’t hit or touch, it’s the officials.

What do you think of the incident? Was it accidental or intentional?

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