Night in Spotlight Lingers for Substitute Referee

Paul McInnis’ career as a National Hockey League referee lasted only one game. It was a night he and the league will never forget.

On May 8, 1988, McInnis, Vin Godleski and Jim Sullivan stepped in when the scheduled officials--referee Dave Newell, linesmen Gord Broseker and Ray Scapinello and backup referee Denis Morel--refused to work. The regular officials said they would not take the ice as long as New Jersey Coach Jim Schoenfeld was on the bench for Game 4 of the Wales Conference finals against Boston.

But the Devils had obtained a court order barring the league from suspending Schoenfeld over an incident with referee Don Koharski after Game 3. With no way to keep Schoenfeld from coaching and none of its regular officials willing to work the game, the NHL delayed the start of the game for more than an hour before McInnis, Godleski and Sullivan, three minor officials with amateur officiating experience, took the ice.

A year later, McInnis, manager of a skating rink in Yonkers, N.Y., says he had no idea that he would be making his NHL debut that night.

“I was at the third game, but I was upstairs helping out with the stats and I didn’t really see what happened until I saw it on TV,” he said. “All I could see that night was some pushing and shoving, but from way upstairs, I couldn’t see down the hallway.

“Driving to the arena on Sunday, I had no idea that there would be any problems. In fact, when I got there, we all sat down and had a big dinner. Later on, I could taste that dinner all night.”

McInnis found out about an hour before the game was scheduled to start that there was a chance he, Godleski and Sullivan might be called on.

“There was no way in a hundred years we ever thought that we’d actually have to go out there,” McInnis said. “But sure enough, when the regular guys came out and saw Schoenfeld behind the bench, they walked out. John McCauley, the NHL Supervisor of Officials, turned to us and said, ‘you’re it.”

It was such an unexpected development that McInnis, who officiates local high school and college games and has worked some NHL rookie games, didn’t even have his equipment with him.

“Vinny had some in his car; he had his skates and shirt and pads. Jim Sullivan and I didn’t have anything. I went out there in Vinny’s shirt and a pair of sweat pants and some of (Devils forward) Aaron Broten’s skates. Vinny and Jim had to use yellow practice jerseys for the first period until someone found them shirts.”

McInnis said the three stand-ins had to do some thinking before deciding to take the ice.

“It did occur to us that we could refuse. I mean, we had to think about it,” he said. But we’re employed (as off-ice officials) by the NHL, not the Devils, and we figured that this was the league saying ‘do the game.’ So I figured that if I could help to get this game in, I was going to do it.”

A pregame meeting solicited promises of cooperation from both coaches, and McInnis said he only had one big concern when he dropped the puck to start the game.

“I wasn’t particularly nervous when we went out there. The only thing that I was concerned about was that I wasn’t wearing my own skates. I’m kind of a fanatic about my skates and having them fit right and I was afraid I was going to fall on my tail.”

Less than a minute into the game, Devils goaltender Sean Burke shot the puck into the crowd, drawing an automatic penalty.

“I think that helped settle me down, and everybody else, too” he said. “It was an easy call. But both teams had no idea whether I knew anything about the game, and calling the penalty helped.”

By the second period, it was playoff hockey as usual.

“The first period was nice and easy. But the second period got back to normal--everybody was cursing. It got real physical in the second period.

“The third period was nice, not a bad period at all. Both teams mostly played hockey. I called a lot of double penalties and probably didn’t call a few things I could have, but I didn’t want to be the one to decide the game.”

After the game, a 3-1 victory for New Jersey, came the hard part.

“With all the media that was there, it took us about two hours to get out of the building. There were about 500 media people there; there were five different TV feeds going out that night and we couldn’t get out of the building.”

“I got to bed about three in the morning, I guess, and about seven, the telephone rang. It was a radio station from Prince Edward Island. I guess it had been on television that that’s where I was born, and as soon as that got around, every radio station in Canada started calling.

“Then, when I got to work, there were a half-dozen TV cameras waiting for me.”

“There was a parade of telephone calls for the next two weeks--radio shows, call in shows from all over the world; California, Alaska, Europe. I had a call from Switzerland. It was incredible.”

The attention didn’t stop after the playoffs, either.

“It started up again when I went up to Prince Edward Island for vacation in the summer. We have a house up there. It started all over--there was a parade and a lot of other stuff. “

And what did McInnis, Godleski and Sullivan take home from their night in the playoff spotlight?

“We also got a nice letter from the Devils and (NHL President) John Ziegler and an All-Star jacket from the league. And, of course, we got paid.

“It was a wild night, and it’s something I’ll always remember.”