THE ROUNDUP- PLAYOFF EDITION- APR 29/19

CAROLINA HURRICANES 2 NEW YORK ISLANDERS 1- (Carolina leads 2-0)

The story of the Carolina Hurricanes just continues to grow, as they stole home ice advantage from the Islanders, picking up a 2-1 win yesterday to lead the series two games to none. Already missing 3 key players, the ‘Canes saw Petr Mrazek, Trevon Van Riemsdyk and Saku Maenalanen to injury during the game, but already down 1-0 after a Mathew Barzal shot was deflected off a Carolina stick in the first, Curtis McElhinney came in and shut the door the rest of the way.

The Islanders appeared to have scored in the final minute of the 2nd period, but it was ruled that Devon Toews kicked the puck in, and the goal was disallowed.

I agree it’s impressive, but that is a clear kicking motion. So the ‘Canes survive a scare and head into the 3rd trailing by a goal. How they respond to this close call is even more impressive. 13 seconds into the 3rd, Warren Foegele strikes.

And then 48 seconds later, Nino Niederreiter gets his first of the playoffs, deflecting a Tuvo Teravainen shot past Robin Lehner for what would be the winning goal.

McElhinney stopped all 17 Islanders shots he faced. The Islanders have just one goal to show for their two home games, and it came off a bounce. This is not what anyone envisioned this series to be, but we should be used to this by now: this playoff year makes no sense at all. As far as their growing injured list, we likely won’t know more until later today at least.

Jaccob Slavin notched his 10th assist of the playoffs, which is a Hurricanes/Whalers franchise record for most playoff assists by a defenceman.

COLORADO AVALANCHE 4 SAN JOSE SHARKS 3- (Series tied 1-1)

A 3 point night from Tyson Barrie helped the Colorado Avalanche take a 4-3 win over San Jose and tie their series at a game a piece. San Jose opened the scoring on a goal from Evander Kane.

That held up to the 2nd, when Colorado took the lead on goals from Gabriel Landeskog

and Barrie, which was his 1st of the post-season.

The Avs made it 3-1 on a goal from former Shark Matt Nieto halfway through the 3rd period.

Then comes the furious Sharks comeback attempt, with around 5 minutes to go as Brent Burns tried to take the game over. Check out Alex Kerfoot’s skate blade get knocked off by Burns’ original shot!

Then Burns lays one of the biggest hits of the playoffs on Matt Calvert. Just one problem, Calvert still completes the pass to Nathan MacKinnon, who scores into the empty net to make it 4-2.

Burns was not done, though, and scored with 10 seconds left to make it 4-3 but they couldn’t get the equalizer and the series will now shift to Denver for Games 3 and 4.