Tampa Bay Lightning head coach Jon Cooper did not hold back Thursday night ripping into the ruling that erased Nikita Kucherov’s dramatic game-tying goal in the final minute of a 4-3 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins.The chaos unfolded with 55.4 seconds left in regulation when Kucherov buried a loose puck to seemingly tie the game. The NHL’s Situation Room initiated a review and ultimately overturned the goal ruling that Brandon Hagel had committed an illegal hand pass earlier in the sequence.Officials determined that the play violated Rule 79 which disallows a goal if a teammate has directed the puck with his hand before the scoring sequence.Cooper, visibly frustrated, questioned both the intent and the interpretation of the rule afterward.“There are a couple of things. Did he mean to do it or was it deflected? Was there an advantage gained or not? And you could really debate whether an advantage was gained,” Cooper said. “Did Brandon Hagel direct that puck knowing exactly where it was going? No.”The Lightning coach argued Hagel’s action was not a deliberate attempt to move the puck comparing it instead to a reflexive act of self-protection.“Would you sit here today and say, ‘Brandon Hagel was maybe protecting his face from a puck hitting it or protecting some part of his body?’ If I threw this microphone at you right now, would you put your hand up to stop it? Hell yeah you would,” Cooper said. “So there is a spirit of the rule. Was that the spirit of the rule if he takes it in the face? Come on.”He stressed on the chaos of the play describing it as “bang-bang” with multiple bodies in the area and no clear directed motion from Hagel.“There were tons of guys around him. It turned out we got it first, a lot of the game developed after that, and the puck went in the net. Is that a really frustrating one for me? It is… it is laughable that that got overturned.”NHL clarified reason for overturning Nikita Kucherov’s game-tying goalThe NHL clarified the reason behind the controversial overturning of Nikita Kucherov’s apparent game-tying goal. The play was reviewed under Rule 38, Coach’s Challenge, which allows officials to overturn an on-ice call only if there is a conclusive and irrefutable determination from video evidence that the original call was clearly incorrect.If any doubt remains, the call on the ice stands. Following the review, the Situation Room determined that Brandon Hagel directed the puck to Jake Guentzel with a hand pass at 1:08 of the third period, just 13 seconds before Kucherov’s goal. This technicality rendered the goal invalid under Rule 79.The game itself had been a rollercoaster. Pittsburgh built an early lead in the first period on Ville Koivunen’s first NHL goal and then extended it in the second period with a breakaway tally from Evgeni Malkin followed by a power-play goal from Ben Kindel which gave the Penguins a 3-0 advantage.Tampa Bay finally got on the board late in the second when Kucherov scored. In the third period, Brandon Hagel sparked a furious Lightning comeback with two goals tying the game before Kucherov’s apparent tying goal was controversially overturned. Evgeni Malkin then netted his second of the night with 2:43 remaining to make it four for the Penguins.