Lightning win Game 5, deny Avs chance to take Stanley Cup

DENVER (AP) — The Stanley Cup was in the building and just waiting to be paraded around the ice.

Pack it up. It’s heading back to Florida.

The resilient Tampa Bay Lightning spoiled Colorado’s party to stay in the hunt for a third straight Stanley Cup title, beating the Avalanche 3-2 on Friday night in Game 5.

Ondrej Palat scored with 6:22 remaining and Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 35 shots in front of a raucous crowd hoping to celebrate the Avalanche’s first championship in 21 years.

“That’s what good teams do — you find a way,” Lightning forward Corey Perry said. “Keep plugging along. This is fun. This is what hockey’s all about, different guys stepping up at different times.”

Game 6 is Sunday night in Tampa. The Lightning trail the best-of-seven series 3-2.

“Listen, this is a huge challenge for us,” Lightning forward Pat Maroon said. “An exciting challenge, too. You’ve got to be excited for this challenge and embrace it.”

The Cup was all shined up and ready for the moment — almost beckoning to the Avalanche from the side. It’s back on the road for the Avalanche, where they’re 8-1 so far in their playoff run.

“We have belief in our room that we can win every game we go out and play,” defenseman Devon Toews said. “We feel like we had a decent game tonight, pretty good game. Obviously it wasn’t enough tonight.”

Nikita Kucherov and defenseman Jan Rutta also scored for the Lightning. Valeri Nichushkin and Cale Makar had goals for Colorado. Makar’s third-period tally bounced off the skate of Erik Cernak and through the pads of Vasilevskiy to tie it at 2.

That set the stage for Palat, whose shot slipped through the pads of Darcy Kuemper. It was Palat’s 16th career go-ahead playoff goal, which trails only Brayden Point (18) in franchise history.

“I thought I played it well, slid over,” Kuemper said. “It just found a little hole.”

Tampa Bay regrouped after an emotional Game 4 loss at home on a overtime goal from Colorado forward Nazem Kadri. The Lightning felt the Avalanche might have had too many players on the ice on the winner.

A similar too-many-players-on-the-ice scenario unfolded Friday — and this time it was called. With 2:43 remaining, the Lightning went on the power play and made it so that Colorado couldn’t pull Kuemper until the final moments. They weathered the Avalanche’s late barrage.

Just the Lightning showing their championship mettle. They’ve already rallied back from a 3-2 deficit to Toronto in the first round, and climbed out of a 2-0 hole against the New York Rangers in the Eastern Conference finals.

Completing this comeback series win would put them in an entirely different category. Only one team has rallied to capture a Game 7 in the final after trailing 3-1 in a series — the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs.

This is a gritty Lightning squad that’s showing no signs of slowing down against a speedy Avalanche team and even after all the contests they’ve logged. Tampa Bay has played in 67 postseason games since the start of the first round in 2020, nearly an entire extra season.

Their resolve has impressed Lightning coach Jon Cooper. His team improved to 3-0 this season when facing potential elimination games.

“The mental fortitude you have to have to not buckle in the environment we were just in and play the type of game they did, there’s a reason they’ve got a couple rings on their fingers,” Cooper said.

The Avalanche are trying to capture their first title since 2001. The Avalanche fans were out in full force — both inside the building (an upper-level ticket on game day was going for around $1,500) and outside at a nearby watch party.

“It’s not supposed to be easy and it’s not going to be easy,” Avalanche captain Gabriel Landeskog said. “We knew that coming into this. We knew that coming into tonight. ... Short memory in the playoffs and that’s what we’re going to do.”

The Avalanche are 2 for 2 in their visits to the Stanley Cup Final. They also won in 1996, which was their inaugural season in Denver after relocating from Quebec.

Soon after Nichushkin tied it at 1-apiece in the second, Kucherov knocked in a goal off the post. The power-play goal was with Alex Killorn in the box for holding, along with J.T. Compher (holding the stick) and Makar (tripping), making for a 4-on-3 situation.

Bednar wasn’t exactly thrilled with the call on Makar.

“There was no intent there. I don’t even think he was checking that guy,” Bednar said. “Look to me like he kind of tripped over a stick. It’s a tough one.”

Kuemper finished with 26 saves.

“He was OK,” Bednar said. “I’d like to see him get the first one, obviously.”

That first one would be Rutta’s score less than five minutes into the game that zapped some of the energy from the crowd. It was his first goal of these playoffs.

“We’ve been here. Have we been down 3-1? No,” Cooper said. “But we’ve been in these situations where we know the feeling of being in an elimination game.”

-Associated Press

Hockey: NHL players' union brass mull return to play plans

The National Hockey League's union brass are expected to give the green light to a 24-team playoff format that would crown the Stanley Cup champion, TSN.ca reported on Friday night.

The Canadian sports broadcaster said the conference-based proposal is expected to get at least 18 of the possible 31 votes needed for it to pass. 

Voting on the plan -- to play behind closed doors and in hub cities -- was expected to take place on Friday.

Under the proposed schedule, the top four seeds in each conference would receive byes into the second round.

The seeds would be determined by the number of points each team had on March 12, when the NHL shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The top four seeds in the Eastern Conference would be the Boston Bruins, Tampa Bay Lightning, Washington Capitals and Philadelphia Flyers. 

The top four seeds in the Eastern Conference would be the Boston Bruins, Tampa Bay Lightning, Washington Capitals and Philadelphia Flyers. 

The top four Western Conference teams would be the St. Louis Blues, Colorado Avalanche, Vegas Golden Knights and Dallas Stars. 

The other 16 teams would play in a best-of-five first round.

The rest of the bracketed playoff format would have the five vs. 12 winner playing the fourth seed, the six vs. 11 winner playing the three seed, the seven vs. 10 winner playing the two seed and the eight vs. nine winner playing the one seed in best-of-seven series, according to the report.

All remaining series would be best-of-seven.

gph/st

Agence France-Presse

Ice hockey: Bruins overtake Blues, win Stanley Cup Final opener

BOSTON -- Sean Kuraly and Brad Marchand scored in the third period for the last of four unanswered Boston goals as the Bruins rallied past the St. Louis Blues, 4-2, in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final on Monday.

Kuraly's goal came after St. Louis goaltender Jordan Binnington fumbled a shot from Zdeno Chara. Noel Acciari collected the puck in front of the net, and after a failed second attempt, dished to Kuraly, who slid it in to break a 2-2 tie at 5:21.

Marchand added an empty-netter with 1:49 remaining.

Binnington stopped 34 shots in the loss, including 27 across the final two periods. Tuukka Rask made 18 saves for Boston.

The win was the Bruins' eighth straight, while the defeat dropped the Blues to 0-13 in finals history. Game 2 of the best-of-seven series is Wednesday in Boston.

Trailing 2-0 and off to a sluggish start after 11 days between games, the Bruins caught fire in the second period to knot the score.

Connor Clifton struck first, redirecting a pass from Kuraly just within the right post at 2:16 to make it 2-1. After Boston failed to convert on its first three power plays, Charlie McAvoy scored on the man advantage when his shot went off Alex Pietrangelo's stick and past Binnington for a tie game at 12:41.

The rest of the contest was all Bruins, as they outshot the Blues 30-12 over the final 40 minutes.

Prior to Boston's surge, St. Louis had been in control. Vladimir Tarasenko took advantage of a bad turnover by David Pastrnak to make it 2-0 at the one-minute mark of the second. The goal extended Tarasenko's points streak to seven games.

Brayden Schenn scored the lone first-period tally for the Blues at 7:23 when a shot he ripped on Rask bounced off the netminder and was redirected back to him on passes from Jay Bouwmeester and Jaden Schwartz. Schenn then put it past Rask for his second goal in two games following a 13-game drought.

The Bruins had two chances on the power play later in the first but couldn't convert, with Marcus Johansson coming closest when he rung the post on the first chance with the man advantage.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

NHL: Joy and disbelief as Washington Capitals win hockey title

WASHINGTON - A red sea of tens of thousands of fans boiled over in jubilation Thursday as the Washington Capitals won the Stanley Cup for the first time in team's 44-year history.

Capital One Arena in downtown Washington, the Caps' home stadium, was full to the rafters and rocking for a free jumbotron viewing of the away game. 

Many more boisterous fans wearing red Caps jerseys spilled into surrounding Chinatown streets to cheer on their side.

In the end, the 4-3 triumph over the Las Vegas Golden Knights in game five of the National Hockey League finale series was particularly sweet for Caps fans sadly used to seeing their team reach the playoffs fairly regularly, only to choke well before reaching the final round.

"It's beautiful," fan Bobby Parrish told The Washington Post.

"This is incredible. I mean, I've grown up being disappointed and yet I still come back. Sometimes I don't know why. Until it finally happens. It's why you wasted so many years supporting this team. I mean, it's so rewarding."

In the after-game delirium, fans screamed as they hugged each other in gridlocked streets and drivers honked their horns all over the city, as far away as the K Street corridor of lobbyist power not far from the White House.

After Lars Eller scored the go ahead goal for the Caps with 7:37 to go and Washington held on until the final buzzer, people inside the arena shot their arms up in glee, ran onto the basketball court at the center of the multi-purpose facility or even chucked their beer straight into the air.

"Unlike anything I've ever seen before," fan Mark Creamer, 22, told the Post.

Washington is a big sports town and fans were particularly hungry because the last major crown here was the Washington Redskins' 1992 win in the Super Bowl.

dw/jta

source: news.abs-cbn.com

NHL: Penguins strike late to repeat as Stanley Cup champs

Patric Hornqvist's late goal followed by an empty-netter from Carl Hagelin lifted the Pittsburgh Penguins to a thrilling 2-0 Stanley Cup-clinching victory over the Nashville Predators on Sunday.

With the victory, the Penguins clinched the best-of-seven championship 4-2 to win the franchise's fifth Stanley Cup. They also became the NHL's first repeat champion since Detroit did it 19 years ago.

Hornqvist scored the game-winning goal with only 95 seconds left when he batted a puck that had bounced off the end boards out of mid air, off the net and off goaltender Pekka Rinne's back and into the goal.

Hagelin iced the game with 14 seconds left when, with Rinne out of the goal in favor of an extra attacker, he scored into the empty net.

The two late goals followed what had been a very tightly-contest game filled with chances for both teams.

The Penguins caught a huge break early in the second period when the referee lost sight of the puck and mistakenly blew his whistle to stop play moments before Predators forward Colton Sissons poked home a rebound.

The referee thought Penguins goalie Matt Murray had the puck but it had actually trickled just behind him and into the crease where Sissons had what should have been the opening goal.

Sissons had another chance to put his team in front at the midway mark of the period when Pittsburgh got caught on a bad line change but he was denied by Murray on the breakaway chance.

source: news.abs-cbn.com

Stanley Cup: All tickets to Kings rally Thursday are sold out

All 18,000 tickets for the L.A. Kings celebration at Staples Center are sold out, organizers said Tuesday night.

The hourlong "championship rally" is scheduled to begin at Staples Center on Thursday at 2:30 p.m. and will feature video highlights, presentations and speeches from several players.

The event, along with a downtown parade, were announced following the team's Stanley Cup victory Monday over the New Jersey Devils, the team said.

The free tickets were distributed on a first-come, first-served basis and were available online. Officials had said that season-ticket holders and suite and premier seat owners would be given priority, with the remaining tickets made available to the public at 6 p.m. Tuesday.

source: latimes.com