[MikeE]

I watched the match from the sidelines and was surprised there was no penalty called by the Referees for pushing 1501 into the goal, since at the time it looked to me like the defense crossed the line from "spirited" into over-aggressive. (In my younger years I used to referee a very physical contact sport so I'm familiar with policing that particular line, albeit when player safety was at risk.)

In hindsight after watching the video several times I don't see a egregious violation of any specific rule, so I'm not critical of the lack of penalty. Equally, if a penalty had been called, I would not be arguing that it was undeserved.

Finally, perhaps it's the context of a well established New England team against visiting team from a historically strong region, but the choice of thread title also seems unnecessarily provocative.