There was an ongoing (albeit not recently active) discussion about the Statement on Illegal Holding that can be found here. I cannot find it with the recent migration to discourse but we still need a resolution so here is a new thread, apologies if it still exists somewhere else.
I am talking about the tactic where a skater blocks another down by applying shoulder (front) to shoulder (back) downward while they face each other. Assuming this is not a back block and assuming there is no pinning involved, is this covered by the statement mentioned above and therefore an expulsion? Or is it expulsion-worthy only if there is pinning prior to that downward hit?
This is a tactic that has been trained for in recent months, so officials need to be prepared for it somehow, and (no-)call it consistently during post-season. Is there a chance that Rules, well, rules on this before post-season?