[just another ref]

Perhaps I am naive, or have a warped sense of things, but I tend to think that if I had heard a coach make the remark in the OP, the extreme nature of the remark would have caused me to believe that it was certainly not meant to be taken literally. Was the push that he refers to called a foul? If not, I would have thought that what he said was for the officials benefit. Anyhow, I think players at pretty much any level would know that they were not really supposed to punch an opponent in the mouth. I think that it might be more potentially dangerous if a coach was heard to instruct a player to "Use your elbows! That will keep him off of you when he starts that pushing again?" A T in this situation? I have no problem with that. Flagrant? I say probably not.