That’s what a power-play goal looks like? For a while, Hurricanes may have forgotten
The moment the puck went in, under the crossbar and over Igor Shesterkin, Brady Skjei’s face was awash with emotion, even before his teammates swarmed over him.
But what emotion?
Celebration, that the Carolina Hurricanes had recovered from a goaltending gaffe to take a late lead with their playoff lives hanging by a thread?
Or relief, that their power play had finally converted on its 17th chance of the series against the New York Rangers?
“Celebration,” Skjei’s voice said, afterward, but his body language said relief, and given the travails on the power play that put the Hurricanes to the brink of elimination in the first place, it was almost certainly a mix of both.
Seeing the Hurricanes score on the power play was like spotting a snow leopard. It had been so long, it was difficult to remember if such a thing actually existed. Before Saturday’s season-prolonging 4-3 win in Game 4, the Hurricanes were in a 3-0 hole to the Rangers almost entirely because of it
Scoreless on five opportunities in Game 1, a one-goal loss. Scoreless on five opportunities in Game 2, a one-goal loss. Not only scoreless on five opportunities in Game 3, but victimized on a shorthanded goal. In a one-goal loss. The Hurricanes were going backward.
In the wake of that one, Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour made a slightly out-of-character adjustment, elevating Skjei and Teuvo Teravainen to the top unit in place of Brent Burns and Jake Guentzel after the struggling Burns could no longer be trusted to man the blue line. Tony DeAngelo even took his spot late in Game 3, after Burns was caught flat-footed on the Rangers’ goal.
“You’re going to go through those stretches,” Brind’Amour said. “You don’t want to give up chances. That’s the real dagger.”
And what happens, when the Hurricanes get their second chance of the game with the score tied 3-3 and less than four minutes to go? Teravainen tees up Skjei, who rips it past Shesterkin as Seth Jarvis waves his stick in front of his face, for the go-ahead goal and what held up as the game-winner. Sometimes, you can draw it up that way.
“Everybody’s talking about the power play — need to score, need to score goals, especially this time of the year,” Teravainen said. “Finally our work paid off, so it’s good. Good to get that little confidence boost. Right time of the game, too.”
For the first time in this series, the Rangers were the ones tipping their caps instead.
“I thought the penalty kill was still good,” Rangers coach Peter Laviolette said. “They had a shot from the point. They hammered it. It had eyes. A top-corner shot. Traffic in front of the net. There was a lot going on there.”
Under any circumstance, it would have been a release. After the Hurricanes blew a 3-1 lead — built playing the high-energy first period they had to play facing elimination, with Sebastian Aho leading by example — it felt like a get-out-of-jail-free card. Especially when the tying goal was banked off Frederik Andersen’s backside by Alexis Lafreniere from below the goal line.
If their power play failed them then, as it had 16 times throughout the series to that point, they might not ever get another chance.
“(Sebastian Aho) said today, go out there and feel like our power play is clicking and we have a little confidence and swagger, and I thought we did that,” Skjei said.
The goal came so late, but not too late, that it was impossible to sense whether that’s a dam-breaker for a power play that’s had its chances but no goals. But as the Hurricanes try to work their way out of this hole after three one-goal losses, whatever slim chances they have are nonexistent without some production with the man advantage.
This is, actually, what that looks like. The Hurricanes finally remembered. Very late. Maybe not too late.
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