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Blackhawks Win Again but Cut It Close
CHICAGO — That was more like it, a game more befitting the Stanley Cup finals than the defensive train wreck that was Game 1. The result, however, was the same: a one-goal victory for the Chicago Blackhawks.
After Monday night’s 2-1 win, they are just two games from winning the Cup, and with the series shifting to Philadelphia on Wednesday, the Flyers still have not quite figured out how to handle the Blackhawks.
Chicago scored its goals 28 seconds apart late in the second period, but Philadelphia came close to tying in the third, after Simon Gagne scored on the power play with 14 minutes 40 seconds to go. But Antti Niemi, the Blackhawks’ rookie goalie, was excellent in preserving the one-goal lead in the frantic final minutes.
“I don’t think we got outplayed,” Flyers Coach Peter Laviolette said. “Their goaltender played extremely well in the third period. We had more than enough looks to tie up that game. It just didn’t happen.”
After having his problems in Saturday’s 6-5 victory, Niemi impressed through the first two periods Monday by flashing his glove hand to make several brilliant saves.
And in the third, when the swarming Flyers piled up a 15-4 shooting advantage, Niemi held them off. A Kimmo Timonen shot, a close-range rebound from Gagne, a last-minute shot from Jeff Carter — Niemi stopped them all, and after the game was given an extended, deafening ovation from the sellout crowd at the United Center.
“It’s an unbelievable feeling how the people react,” Niemi said.
He also said that the confidence he had now, as opposed to at the start of the season, when he was uncertain of earning even the backup goalkeeping job, was like “night and day, a huge difference, and I think that’s the biggest reason why I can play this well right now.”
This spring, the Blackhawks are conducting a master class in third-period resilience. It was the 10th consecutive time this postseason that they won a game in which the teams were tied or separated by one goal in the third period.
The Flyers were doing a fine job of stopping Chicago through the game’s first 37 minutes, riding vastly improved goalkeeping from Michael Leighton, who had been pulled from the series opener.
But then the Blackhawks struck twice in the middle period. First Marian Hossa scored, flipping in a rebound of a Patrick Sharp shot at 17:09. Moments later Ben Eager beat Leighton high on the short side from 40 feet, a shot Leighton probably should have stopped.
For Hossa, the first N.H.L. player to appear in three straight Stanley Cup finals with three different teams, the goal ended an eight-game scoring drought.
“It bugged me, definitely,” Hossa said. “I tried not to get frustrated, but it’s in your head. I was waiting for something, like that garbage goal I scored.”
Hossa is trying to win his first Cup after losing in 2008 with Pittsburgh and in 2009 with Detroit. But despite scoring only three goals so far, he is doing an excellent job this postseason; his plus-11 mark ties him for the league lead.
For Eager, it was only the second goal in 33 career playoff games. He started his career as a Flyers No. 1 draft choice and played four and a half years as a popular brawler with Philadelphia’s A.H.L. and N.H.L. teams, before being traded to the Blackhawks during the 2007-8 season.
“I had a lot of great times in Philadelphia — they gave me a chance to play in the N.H.L., and I’m thankful for that,” Eager said. “It’s going to be a great atmosphere at the Wachovia Center next game.
The game was also chippy, thanks largely to the continuing one-on-one sumo match between the big-bodied Flyers defenseman Chris Pronger and the hulking Blackhawks forward Dustin Byfuglien. Pronger also tried cross-checking Byfuglien’s center, Jonathan Toews, and throwing an elbow at his wingman, Patrick Kane. He also waved bye-bye to Eager when Eager went to the bench after a post-whistle scrum.
Philadelphia supplied nastiness in the form of Dan Carcillo, who had been scratched for Game 1 and the last two games of the previous series, against Montreal, when the Flyers got all their injured forwards back.
In the first period Monday, Carcillo skated on the Flyers’ top line alongside Mike Richards and Carter, and immediately started picking on Chicago’s Tomas Kopecky.
Seven minutes into the game, Carcillo tried to body-check Kopecky in open ice and instead flattened Carter, knocking his teammate’s helmet askew. Carcillo’s response was to stand nose to nose with Kopecky, jawing, and left only after head-butting Kopecky.
SLAP SHOTS
Home teams that swept the first two games of the final series have gone on to win the Stanley Cup 31 of 33 times since the N.H.L. switched to a best-of-seven format in 1939. The only two teams to lose were last year’s Red Wings, who fell to the Penguins in seven games, and — an ominous note for Chicago — the 1971 Blackhawks, who lost in seven to the Canadiens. ... To make room for Dan Carcillo, Philadelphia Coach Peter Laviolette scratched forward James van Riemsdyk. Also scratched was Flyers defenseman Ryan Parent, who was replaced by Oskars Bartulis.
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Originally Posted by treece
