Carolina Hurricanes sweep Flyers in overtime to move to 8-0 in playoffs, first such start in franchise history
The Carolina Hurricanes completed a four-game sweep of the Philadelphia Flyers, winning 3-2 in overtime to take their second-round series and improve to 8-0 in this year's NHL playoffs — the best postseason start in franchise history. The deciding goal came at 5:28 of overtime from Jackson Blake, who also scored Carolina's opener and was named first star of the game.
The Hurricanes pressed early at home in the Lenovo Center. In the first period, Blake redirected a Sebastian Aho cross-ice feed past Flyers goaltender Carter Hart for a 1-0 lead. Philadelphia answered in the second through a Cam York point shot that beat Pyotr Kochetkov on a screen, and a Tyson Foerster tap-in late in the period made it 2-1 to the visitors heading into the third.
A tense final regulation period saw both teams trade chances. Aho scored at 51:00 to tie it on a wraparound that beat Hart short-side, and the Flyers regained the lead at 56:13 with William Foster's tip-in off a faceoff. Carolina pulled Kochetkov for the extra attacker with 1:49 to play, and at 58:51 a Jordan Martinook shot from the blue line was deflected in by Aho — his second of the night, his second of the series.
In overtime, Brind'Amour deployed his three-three line construction, designed for sustained zone time on broken-symmetry rushes. Blake's winner came off a transition started by Aho holding possession behind the net, drawing two defenders, before sending the puck across to Blake breaking down the slot. Hart had no chance on the high glove-side shot. The Lenovo Center crowd of 18,680 stayed standing for a full minute after the goal.
The sweep is the deepest postseason mark in franchise history. The previous best — a 6-0 start — came in 2002, the year Carolina lost the Stanley Cup Final to Detroit. This year's club looks more complete and deeper: six skaters scored at least two goals in this series, and the defensive metrics matched the offensive show, with a five-on-five expected goals against average of 1.8 across the four games.
Brind'Amour, in his post-game press conference, said: "Sweeping is never easy — especially against a Flyers team that's as balanced as this one. But we stayed in our discipline, our special teams worked, our goaltender saved us at the right moments. This is the team we have been building since the start of the season." Kochetkov allowed only eight goals across the four games and posted a .942 save percentage.
Flyers coach John Tortorella was direct: "I respect them. They earned the sweep. We expected better from ourselves — we needed three saves out of three across the series and didn't get them. We'll do a deep look at this when we sit down for our season review next month." Philadelphia finished the regular season third in the Atlantic Division and dispatched the New Jersey Devils in six games in the first round.
The win sets up an Eastern Conference final against either the New York Rangers or the Toronto Maple Leafs, who are tied 2-2 in their semifinal. Carolina has reached the conference final twice in the past three seasons but has won the Stanley Cup only once, in 2006. Brind'Amour was the captain of that team; this could be his strongest squad as a coach.
Blake spoke afterwards about the winner: "The moment Aho drew those two defenders back behind the net, the rest was just execution. It's the shot I take in practice every day. To do it in a moment like that — that's special." The 21-year-old winger has emerged as one of the NHL's fastest-rising players this season, finishing the regular season at 1.1 points per game and adding four goals in the playoffs.
Carolina now has roughly a week's rest before the conference final. Brind'Amour said his players will take three days off after the series concludes and then start two days of practice to ramp up. "With the performance in this match, we are in the best position we've been in to push into a conference final," he said. "But there are still teams ahead of us. We won't forget that." Carolina is two rounds from the Stanley Cup.