Holtby won his 20th game in the playoffs, “tying Olie Kolzig for most in Capitals history”.
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Well, yeah. That was stressful and awful and we all agreed that if it repeated itself at all tonight in Game 5 in D.C. that it would end the Flyers season. This is the eighth time in the past nine seasons the Capitals have reached the playoffs, but they have not reached the conference finals in that span. They managed just one more before the horn sounded to end the period. “We didn”t start to panic, and in the past we have “ and I think Neuvy had something to do with that (calmness).”.
It’s the television executives in both the U.S. and Canada crying tears of joy after the Washington Capitals eliminated the Philadelphia Flyers in Game 6.When the final buzzer sounded and the Capitals rightfully went to mob their goaltender, the Flyers congregated around Neuvirth, who was marvelous in all three of his appearances in the playoffs. The orange and black threatened in the third period and pulled Neuvirth with 1:35 remaining, but to no success. We know they (the fans) are going to be ready and have them on our side.
Neuvirth turned aside 16 shots in the second period.
Alex Ovechkin, a dominating player all series, set up the goal by keeping the puck in the zone – he made nice moves to avoid Radko Gudas and Pierre-Edouard Bellemare near the blue line – and feeding Johansson. They handled that situation with typical aplomb on Sunday, with Nicklas Backstrom’s wrister at 8:59 of the second period holding up as the victor.
“Nicky made a pretty flawless shot, and we knew it was going to take a ideal shot to be Neuvy”, said Braden Holtby after the game. “Yeah, we had a lot of shots, but we have to do a better job of getting to the interior and staying out of the box”.
Neuvirth’s 44-shot postseason shutout was a Flyers franchise record.
“Coming into this series, I looked at it like it was going to be a long series”, Washington coach Barry Trotz said. “That’s no secret. Goalies played well for us throughout the whole series. It kind of took the pressure off our shoulders”.
Five seconds off the first faceoff, Wayne Simmonds drew a hook from Matt Niskanen. Ryan White took a high stick to the nose.
Apart from the one powerplay – derived from Jason Chimera Boarding Jakub Voracek – where Washington did manage to break out some scoring opportunities, the Caps dominated the Flyers.
“We were trying”, said the Flyers’ Braden Schenn. “They played tight defensively and when you get a chance, you’ve got to beat Holtby”.
“They pressured us at every point”, said the Flyers’ Simmonds. But we’ve just got to get greasy around the net.
On the other side, the under is 3-1-1 in the Flyers’ last five games overall, is 5-2-3 in their last 10 games following a win, and is 5-1-2 in their last eight games playing on one day of rest.
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Early in the third period, a Flyers fan held up a sign directed at Washington that read, “You’ll choke”. The Flyers went 1-for-24 with the man advantage. Instead, the Capitals were listless and complacent, and their failures in a 2-1 loss in that game, followed by a 2-0 defeat on Wednesday in which their effort was foiled by former goaltender Michal Neuvirth, started to feed the narrative.
