THREE HARD LAPS
* After Derek Carr of the Las Vegas Raiders made an appearance in front of a full house at T-Mobile Arena, Jonathan Marchessault and Max Pacioretty quarterbacked the Golden Knights’ third-period rally by scoring goals 45 seconds apart late in the third period.
* Carey Price and the Canadiens will return to Bell Centre with a 2-0 lead in their Second Round series after they shut out the Jets in Game 2.
* A pair of pivotal Game 4s go today as the Hurricanes and Islanders look to even their series with the Lightning and Bruins, respectively.
VEGAS VICTORIOUS IN FRONT OF FIRST CAPACITY CROWD THIS SEASON
Jonathan Marchessault and Max Pacioretty scored goals 45 seconds apart as the Golden Knights turned a 2-1 deficit into a 3-2 lead with less than six minutes remaining in regulation to avoid a 3-0 series hole and hand the Avalanche their first loss this postseason (6-1). Vegas’ victory came in front of 17,504 fans at T-Mobile Arena, marking the NHL’s first full-capacity crowd this season.
* Pacioretty’s winner was the Golden Knights’ latest go-ahead goal scored in regulation time during a postseason game, eclipsing the previous mark set by William Carrier in the 2020 Stanley Cup Qualifiers against the Stars (54:47).
* Pacioretty and Marchessault combined for the third-fastest two goals scored by Vegas in a playoff contest, behind Game 3 of the 2018 First Round (0:21: James Neal & William Karlsson) and Game 1 of the 2018 Second Round (0:26: Cody Eakin & Erik Haula).
CANADIENS HEADED HOME WITH 2-0 SERIES LEAD, FIVE-GAME WINNING STREAK
Carey Price turned aside all 30 shots he faced and Tyler Toffoli tallied a shorthanded goal as Montreal blanked Winnipeg to grab a 2-0 series lead and extend its winning streak to five games.
* Price pocketed the eighth playoff shutout of his NHL career and owns the fourth-most among active goaltenders behind Marc-Andre Fleury (16), Henrik Lundqvist (10) and Jonathan Quick (9). Five of his postseason shutouts have been earned during games in which the Canadiens were the road team, which trails only Jacques Plante (7) for the most in franchise history.
* Montreal earned five consecutive wins within a postseason for the first time since recording a run of equal length during the 2014 Stanley Cup Playoffs. The last time the club had a postseason winning streak of longer than five contests was in 1993, when they registered a franchise-record 11-game run en route to winning their most-recent Stanley Cup.
* Montreal has not trailed since the start of Game 5 in the First Round, totaling 316:14 of playing time over that span. The Canadiens’ longest such streak during the 2020-21 regular season was 183:34 (spanning from Jan. 21-30).
EPISODE ONE OF “QUEST FOR THE STANLEY CUP” PREMIERES ON ESPN+, YOUTUBE
Episode one of Quest For The Stanley Cup, the behind-the-scenes documentary series chronicling the remaining eight teams in the 2021 Stanley Cup Playoffs, premiered Friday, exclusively on ESPN+ in the U.S. and on YouTube.com/NHL in Canada.
The first episode opens in Edmonton in 2020 with the Lightning celebrating their Stanley Cup win before fast forwarding to 2021 in Tampa where head coach Jon Cooper discusses the challenges of defending their title. Avalanche captain Gabriel Landeskog offers a glimpse into his home life with his wife, Melissa, and their two young children. The episode concludes with exclusive content on the ice and in the dressing rooms for Games 1 and 2 of the Lightning–Hurricanes series and Game 1 of the Avalanche–Golden Knights series.
HURRICANES, ISLANDERS LOOK TO TIE SERIES IN GAME 4
Saturday’s Second Round schedule gets an early start when the Hurricanes visit the Lightning looking to even their series at two games apiece. The road team has won each of the first three contests between Carolina and Tampa Bay, with the Hurricanes hoping to make their showdown the 30th series (of any type) in League history to see the visiting club claim each of the first four victories. In the nightcap, airing nationally on NBC in the United States, New York will eye a 2-2 deadlock on home ice in a series that has seen the Islanders and Bruins trade wins each game.
* The Hurricanes face a 2-0 series deficit against the defending Stanley Cup champions, a position the club was in just two years ago when they fell behind 2-0 on the road against the Capitals. Carolina rallied to win that series, which saw the home team win each of the first six games before the Hurricanes snapped that streak with a Game 7 victory in D.C. Their series win in the 2019 First Round stands as one of only three times in NHL history that a team has eliminated the defending Stanley Cup champion after facing a 2-0 deficit in a best-of-seven series (also 2009 SCF: PIT vs. DET and 1999 CSF: COL vs. DET).
* The Islanders will look to tie the series yet again after doing so in Game 2 in Boston, the first of two straight overtime contests. The Islanders have not lost consecutive playoff games at Nassau Coliseum in the same year since 2007 when they dropped Games 3 and 4 of the Conference Quarterfinals against the Sabres.
