When Joel Ward of the Washington Capitals scored to win Game 7 in overtime against the Boston Bruins, teammate Mike Knuble was literally standing in between the pads of goalie Tim Thomas.

The Bruins goalie didn't make a stink about it on the ice, nor did he emphatically complain after the game that Knuble interfered with him.

Enter Kerry Fraser, TSN's officiating ombudsman, who implied on his blog Thursday that referees Stephen Walkom and Eric Furlatt blew the call on the series-winning goal in Game 7:

After taking a backhand shot from close in that Tim Thomas saved Knuble continued on his path entering deep into the goal crease and made sufficient physical contact with the Bruins goalie to knock him off his set position and back toward the goal line. The undetected rebound was shot past Thomas as he attempted to pull his head out of Knuble's midsection and right arm.

It would defy logic to maintain that rule 69, as it is written, was not sufficiently violated for the referee to disallow this goal.  (Read the rule here)

Mike Knuble was not pushed, shoved or fouled by a defending player so as to cause him to come into contact with Thomas. It matters not if the contact on Thomas by Knuble was deemed to be deliberate or incidental other than a minor penalty that might result. What matters most is that all the elements of rule 69.1 were violated and the goal should have been waved off.

As it would have been had Mike Knuble been Tomas Holmstrom.

That's all well and good, and the type of thing you'd expect from a retired NHL official who doesn't face any NHL scrutiny or political recourse for calling back an overtime goal on a questionable interference call. Which leads us to our final point:

Does anyone believe for even a [expletive] millisecond that Kerry Fraser — THIS KERRY FRASER — would have disallowed that goal at that point of the game and series?

Here are your Puck Headlines: a glorious collection of news and views collected from the greatest blogosphere in sports and the few, the proud, the mainstream hockey media.

Twitter• Some wondered, 'Hey, what will happen when Don Cherry joins Twitter?' This. This happened. For the record, demanding a trade is Luongo's scape route …[@CoachsCornerCBC]

• Mirtle thinks Roberto Luongo can be Toronto Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke's saviour: "Because he can contribute for another few years at a high level, however, Luongo should be Burke's top target. Toronto likely isn't the goaltender's first (or second) choice, so it will take a bit of a pitch to get him to fully buy in, but there is a relationship there with both Leafs senior VP Dave Nonis and goalie coach Francois Allaire." [Mirtle]

• Joel Ward speaks with USA Today about the racial garbage on Twitter after Game 7: "It doesn't faze me at all. We won, and we are moving on. … People are going to say what they want to say." He also said Jeff Halpern showed him the Tweets on the team plane and apologized that Ward had to see them. [USA TODAY]

• Hear Ward over on the Backhand Shelf podcast. [BS]

• Wayne Simmonds of the Philadelphia Flyers said: "It's the Internet. They can say whatever they want, and they don't have to show their faces. It's disgusting. Things like that have happened to me before. It's not something you want to happen, but it's sad in this day and age that it continues to happen." [Philly.com]

• Ryan Callahan is ready for Game 7 against the Ottawa Senators. [NYDN]

• Did Daniel Alfredsson return from his concussion too quickly? [G&M]

• Boston Bruins goalie Tim Thomas said "they" instead of "we" in postgame comments, fueling the idea that he's on the way out. [Joe Haggerty]

• Frustrating news: "One week after he left Sister Kenny Institute, high school hockey player Jack Jablonski is once again being hospitalized." [CBS, via LiquorPugs]

• Our favorite thing of the day: Fox Sports Arizona reporter Todd Walsh celebrates the end of the Phoenix Coyotes' quest to reach the second round of the playoffs, framing it around former defenseman Gerald Diduck: "He was spent. There wasn't a tooth in his mouth that I could see. His jet black hair soaked. The sockets of his eyes were red from crying, and he wasn't alone. It was an epic loss in an epic series, and the rubble of that loss was strewn about the Valley for more than a decade." [FS Arizona]

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Florida Panthers goalie Jose Theodore has seen the New Jersey Devils at their best and at their most humbled in the 2012 Stanley Cup Playoffs.

In Game 3, the Devils chased him with three goals on six shots in first six minutes of the game. The Panthers eventually rallied to also send Martin Brodeur to the bench and win the game, 4-3.

In Game 5 on home ice, Theodore confidently turned aside all 30 shots he faced for the 3-0 victory.

He didn't play in Florida's Game 6 loss, sitting out due to an undisclosed injury. (Suspected to be his knee, according to the NY Post.) But Coach Kevin Dineen said he's the starter for Thursday night's Game 7 vs. the Devils:

From the Sun Sentinel:

After flip-flopping throughout this grueling first-round series against the New Jersey Devils, Dineen once again resorted to his early-season mantra that Theodore is his starter for Game 7.

"I expect him to go out and do what he's done for us all year,''Dineen said after morning skate. "I've watched his career from a distance and I know the kind of respect he's earned over the course of his career, but when you're in the coaching business you look at short term and what he's done for us this year. He's given us credibility, stability and he doesn't steal games, he goes out there and gives us the save when we need them and he deserves the start if he can go.''

Theodore's the key to the game.

It's a Thursday edition of Marek vs. Wyshynski beginning at 2 p.m. ET/11 a.m. PT, and we're talking about the following and more:

Special Guest Stars: Joe Haggerty of CSNNE gives us the Boston Bruins' obit; Lauren Rubino, the NJ Devils fan who got into a Twitter beef with Michael Yormark of the Panthers, talks about his massive apology to her.

• In which Marek and Wysh discuss Joel Ward's Game 7 heroism and the subsequent racial fallout on social media.

• The Norris finalists.

• Game 7 for Rangers/Senators and Panthers/Devils.

• Previewing tonight's games.

• Puck Headlines and Talking Points

Question of the Day: "Who scores the game-winners in the Game 7s tonight?"

Email your answers to puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or tweet them with the hashtag #MvsW to either @jeffmarek or @wyshynski.

Click here for the Sportsnet live stream or click the play button above! Click here to download podcasts from the show each day Subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or Feedburner.

APJoel Ward of the Washington Capitals was born in Toronto to parents who migrated from Barbados. He used to hear racist taunts playing in youth hockey tournaments, but told the Washington Post this season that "I've [heard] nothing in the NHL."

On Wednesday night, Ward scored the series-winning goal against the Boston Bruins in overtime of Game 7.

The kind of racist language that Ward had avoided throughout his NHL career bubbled to the surface like sewage on social media.

Some of the reaction collected by Capitals Outsider after Ward's game-winner (Strong Language Warning):

"Hey Joel Ward!! You [expletive] spear chucking monkey, why don't you actually DO SOMETHING. You're totally irrelevant"

"How the [expletive] did Joel ward get out of my plantation? #WheresMyCotton"

"Warning to Joel Ward. Your one of three black guys in Canada. I will find you…and I will kill you."

And so on. There was outrage across the hockey world about the language being used about Ward, and on Thursday morning Washington Capitals owner Ted Leonsis thanked those who called out the offending parties via his blog titled "Keyboard courage and ignorance":

Comments about Ward's race were all over social media after Game 7.

[Capitals shed underachiever label by beating Bruins in a gritty Game 7]

Zdeno Chara of the Boston Bruins, Erik Karlsson of the Ottawa Senators and Shea Weber of the Nashville Predators are the three finalists for the 2011-12 James Norris Memorial Trophy.

Getty ImagesIt's the trophy awarded "to the defense player who demonstrates throughout the season the greatest all-round ability in the position," as voted on by the Professional Hockey Writers Association.

It's also likely to spark another round of "shouldn't there be another award given to defensive defensemen?" given that Karlsson's inclusion in the top three will be seen as warranted by some and a sham by others.

Who wins the Norris?

Through his own actions, Tim Thomas has become one of the most divisive players in the NHL. His boycott of the Boston Bruins' White House celebration, and subsequent stonewalling of questions about it, created a groundswell of resentment against him. In the playoffs alone, he's been taunted with Giant Obama Heads and had his page Wiki-vandalized after Game 7.

But after giving up the game-winning goal to Joel Ward of the Washington Capitals in overtime and going through the handshake line, Thomas engaged in one of the most touching, spontaneous moments of the postseason:

A second view, from NESN:

There's a chance this was Thomas' final game with the Boston Bruins.

Getty ImagesSeeing Roberto Luongo as the center of controversy and the scapegoat for playoff failure for the Vancouver Canucks is like comfort food at this point in the season.

Alas, it appears the 2012 Stanley Cup Playoffs will be the last time the netminder wears the whale (barring expansion to Hartford).

Nick Kypreos of Sportsnet reported Thursday morning that Luongo asked the Canucks for a trade in his exit meeting, without the team even asking him to waive his no-trade clause. This comes after Luongo told the media, after Vancouver's 5-game defeat to the Los Angeles Kings, that he wouldn't stand in the way of a deal should the Canucks decide to move forward with Cory Schneider as their goalie.

Luongo holds the cards here, and can veto a trade to Edmonton control where he's traded.

According to reports, the Toronto Maple Leafs are one of the destinations he'd approve.