NHL fines Bowness for smashing stick following brutal loss

This just in, the NHL has fined Dallas Stars head coach Rick Bowness $25,000 for smashing a stick on the Star's bench following his team's loss to the St. Louis Blues on Sunday evening. 

Here's the fineable offense in question:

And if you're wondering what had Bowness so fired up... well I've got to say that I don't blame the guy one bit.

With the Stars leading 1-0 against the Blues with under a minute to play, the refs absolutely blew this one and there's no other way to put it. Stars defender Miro Heiskanen was clearly tripped in the corner yet somehow he ended up with a penalty himself on the play... here's the trip in question:

Heiskanen ended up with a slashing penalty on Blues forward Jordan Kyrou on the play, which if you go back and watch the video is actually pretty apparent.

In any case, because Heiskanen was tripped the Blues were able to work the puck back to the point and eventually tie things up. Moments later on the powerplay they got the go ahead goal, giving the Stars a big fat goose-egg on the scoresheet thanks solely to sloppy officiating. Here's how everything played out, with the NHL conveniently starting the clip 2 seconds after Heiskanen was taken down:

Again, here's the entire sequence on the tying goal:

I've gotta say... I don't blame Bowness one bit for being upset with how things played out. Let the guy smash a stick and get his frustrations out, that's old school hockey to me. What's next? Are we going to fine guys for crossing their arms and furrowing their brow? How soft can this league get?

In any case, here's what Bowness had to say after the game:

"If you're watching the game, you saw what happened. They clearly pulled Miro down. Clearly grabbed his stick and pulled him down. That's my opinion. They got lucky."

"Broken stick on a penalty kill, second goal goes in off our feet. That's the breaks of the game. We played a hell of a hockey game. We deserved a lot better than that. We did. We played a hell of a road game for our third game in three and a half days. We battled hard. We deserved a lot better than that."

- Rick Bowness

I've got to say... I agree with him 100%. And, did you notice that he didn't criticize the officials directly? To me, Bowness did a pretty good job of getting his frustrations out and making a point at the same time. And he STILL gets handed a $25,000 fine for his troubles. Ouch.