Dan,
The referee had to blow the whistle by NHL rule when he lost sight of the puck. It was a bad break for the Wings but it happens. I was personally rooting for the Ducks, but only because I knew I was going to watch the game to the end and didn't want an OT marathon to start at Midnight Central time!
I don't want to hijack this thread, but when I was posting last night I was thinking of the related question - can there be too much width in making angles work? And, if tech allows players to hit straighter, does that suggest narrower fw in combination with angles? I ask because maintenance costs always favor reducing width so we don't want "unnecessary" width AND good golfers find very wide fw to be too easy.
It appears to me from playing and watching TPC that Pete used angles to increase challenge on tee shots as much as he did to present strategy. The angles at TPC demand a controlled and patterned (i.e., draw or fade) tee shot because combining distance and direction becomes critical (regardless of strategy) If those fw were wider, it would reduce the precision demands on the tee shot, and also allow a fw lie (vs rough lie) approach to the green from the less desireable angles, reducing strategy via reducing penalty for a shot in the wrong place. Yes, the very best can spin it from the rough now, also reducing strategy.
It also occurs to me that in the classic strategic hole (play one side for a frontal green opening) can work with narrower fw by adjusting the green angle and contour. If you draw straight par 4 holes on a piece of paper at lengths of 350, 400, 450 and 500 and plot a 40 yard wide fw, you will find that if a player just hits the edge of the fw, the green angle to open up its full depth is 18,11,8 and 5 degrees. If you draw the fw at 60 yards wide, the angles go up proportionally but are still relative.
So the question is, is a 475 par 4 with a 60 yard wide fw and a green set at 8 degrees to the preferred side any better than a hole of the same length with a 40 yard wide fw and a green set at 5 degrees to the preferred side, given that the super must maintain another 50% of fw? And, if the hole is set up so that the player MUST hit within a few yards of the edge of the fw to get the best angle to the Sunday Pin, does having fw 59 yards to the other edge rather than 39 yards right make the hole better or worse?
In short, I think that medium fw - wider than required just to aim at the middle, but not ultra wide - combined with shallow angle greens probably set up the strategy as well as wider fw and steeper angled greens while also using fw angles to increase tee shot challenge. If golf is too much putting (an oft expressed view) giving golfers a free pass on tee shots doesn't create a well balanced test of golf does it?