Anton Levtchi, representing the SHL club Luulaja, hit the puck into his own goal during the postponed penalty, but the shot was disallowed.
On Boxing Day, the Swedish men’s ice hockey league saw a confusing situation where a Finnish forward Anton Levtchi was heavily involved. Levtchi actually put the puck in his own goal during the postponed penalty, but after a long inspection, the shot was rejected.
Lulea’s goalkeeper Matthew Ward had already skated away from his goal, because HV-71 was about to be punished. Jönköping club Jonathan Ang gave the Finnish attacker pressure and Levtchi first seemed to lose the puck. With the next touch, the puck was in the Lulea team’s own goal.
The referees immediately signaled a disallowed hit, but had a long discussion after the situation.
– In order for the goal to be accepted, the player should not be disturbed at all. HV-71’s player affected and interfered with the Luluja player, even though he did not physically touch the puck. It was not possible for us to investigate the situation on video. It took time to talk when there was so much commotion in the hall, Johan Wedin, one of the referees of the match commented to Aftonbladet.
Neither the home team’s players nor the supporters could digest the verdict, especially when the slow motions were running at the same time in the hall’s media cube. The supporters of the next batch had hung a banner that read “judge scandal”.
Luulaja twice came from behind and finally won the match in overtime 4–3. Levtchi was responsible for his team’s 3-3 draw and was about to start Markus Nurmen 1–0 goals and By Brendan Shinnimin the winning goal.
Wedin told SVT that the police had to escort the referee duo out of the arena.
Luulaja is third in the series, HV-71 is last to last. However, the team from Jönköping had a six-game winning streak behind them.