NHL forced to bend its own rules after screw up in Seattle.

A major screw up in the National Hockey League on Saturday night led to a situation that I don't think I've ever witnessed before in all my years covering the NHL.

The New York Rangers traveled to Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle to take on the Seattle Kraken on Saturday night, but when they hit the ice they quickly noticed that something wasn't quite right. The lighting on the Rangers side of the ice was demonstrably darker than the lighting on the Kraken's side of the ice, something that could potentially prove to be a significant advantage for one team over the other.

As a result, the NHL was forced to modify the rules for this one game which resulted in the team's having to swap sides of the ice after every 10 minutes rather than at the end of the period as you would normally expect. Here's a video of the broadcast crew attempting to explain the screw up:

While you might think that this would annoy the players, many of whom are very accustomed to their routines being a certain way, it wasn't everyone who thought the screw up was a negative. Rangers star forward Artemi Panarin was quite happy with the darker lights and credited them for the success he had on the night.

"For me, I want it darker, so it's harder for goalies. That's why I scored two," said Panarin after the game on Saturday.

Now that you've made it through the article, feel free to insert your own jokes about the lights not working at Climate Pledge Arena in the comments.