EASTERN SEMI-FINALS
GAME SUMMARIES
GAME 3:
#1 PHILADELPHIA FLYERS vs #7 PITTSBURGH PENGUINS
Pittsburgh leads 2-1
Next Game: Thursday May 4th, 2000 7:30pm at Pittsburgh
The Philadelphia Flyers' desperation overcame Jaromir Jagr's domination. Jagr rallied Pittsburgh from a two-goal deficit before the Flyers came back on the road to do what they couldn't do at home, winning 4-3 on Andy Delmore's overtime goal Tuesday night to cut the Penguins' series lead to a game. Delmore, a rookie defenseman, scored his first two career playoff goals, the second at 11:01 of overtime to overcome a brilliant game by Jagr, who had two goals and an assist.
The road team won for the third consecutive game in the Eastern Conference semifinals. The seventh-seeded Penguins take a 2-1 lead into Game 4 Thursday, but squandered a chance to virtually wrap up the series by allowing the Flyers to dominate the overtime.
"If had we lost this game, the series would have been all but over," said the Flyers' Keith Jones, who had a goal and two assists.
The top-seeded Flyers outshot the Penguins 11-1 in the extra session and 44-18 overall, with Delmore wristing a shot from the slot past Ron Tugnutt off passes by Jones and Jody Hull.
"I let Jody Hull know how open I was. He made a drop pass to Keith Jones and he made a shovel pass to me," Delmore said. "I was lucky enough to shift from by backhand to my forehand and make the shot."
Jones said, "Delmore was yelling for the puck loud enough that the people up top could hear him. He scored a fantastic goal."
Jagr scored his fourth and fifth goals of the series and had a hand in every Penguins goal as they rallied from Flyers leads of 2-0 and 3-2 before Philadelphia ended an eight-game playoff overtime losing streak.
The Flyers hadn't won a playoff overtime game since Eric Lindros' goal beat New Jersey on June 7, 1995.
"He (Jagr) was unbelievable," Penguins forward Matthew Barnaby said. "That's one of the best games I've ever seen anyone play."
The Flyers, who never led in either game in Philadelphia, opened a 2-0 lead in a frenetically played first period, lost it as Jagr's line scored twice in the second period, then regained it on John LeClair's goal at 7:27 of the third.
"We didn't fold," Flyers goalie Brian Boucher said. "It was almost like we knew it was our turn to win."
The Flyers are one of the NHL's best teams with a lead. But as they already know, that means nothing when Jagr is on the ice -- and that probably seemed to the Flyers like virtually every shift.
Jagr, who appeared to skate in an even higher gear than normal in the second period and kept it going, got open in the high slot, skillfully faked defenseman Eric Desjardins off his skates, and wristed a shot by Boucher at 14:28 of the third for his fourth goal in two games.
"It seemed like we were always coming from behind," Jagr said. "It's tough to do that against a team like Philadelphia. We spent a lot of energy after we got behind 2-0."
As the sellout crowd of 17,148 threatened to lift the steel top off Mellon Arena, the NHL's oldest arena, Flyers coach Craig Ramsay wisely took a timeout to slow Pittsburgh's momentum, and the Penguins never regained it.
The Flyers shortened their bench in the overtime, abandoning Ramsay's four-line rotation to constantly get their best skaters on the ice.
"No, I don't think we ran out of gas," Penguins coach Herb Brooks said. "Jagr really reached out to bail us out tonight, and we really didn't have a lot of things going."
The Penguins had never lost in Game 3 in seven previous playoff series they led 2-0.
Philadelphia changed its top two lines after losing the first two games on home ice, but it was a Penguins line change that led to their comeback.
Brooks replaced Josef Beranek on the top line with Martin Straka, alongside Jan Hrdina and Jagr, and the move paid off with a goal within 40 seconds of the second period.
Straka's shot deflected high into the air off Boucher, who lost his balance and had grab the crossbar to stay on his skates. Jagr jumped on the puck and missed his first rebound attempt, but lifted up a second over Boucher's leg from along the right side of the net.
The same Penguins line tied it later in the second period and again in the third.
Jagr, double teamed in the neutral zone, tapped a pass along the right wing boards to defenseman Bob Boughner. He rammed a cross-ice pass to Straka, who tipped it with the top of his stick into the net at 10:23 of the second before Boucher could react.
The Flyers, who scored only once in 73 shots in the first two games, scored on consecutive shots by Delmore and Jones in the first period.
Delmore scored his first career playoff goal at 14:11, racing to a puck that Tugnutt deflected to the blue line to score from the high slot as Valeri Zelepukin backed into the goalie.
Delmore's goal gave the Flyers their first lead of the series, and they didn't take long to add to it. Penguins forward Alexei Kovalev gave the puck away in the neutral zone, allowing Jones to power a shot inside the far post from the edge of the right circle.
"Sure, this gives them a lift, and now they're thinking they can win," Barnaby said. "But we're happy where we are. We have to be ready to play Game 4 and, if we are, it can be 3-1. I don't think we've played our best game yet."
#3 TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS vs #4 NEW JERSEY DEVILS
New Jersey leads 2-1
Next Game: Wednesday May 3rd, 2000 7pm at New Jersey
If the Toronto Maple Leafs have hopes of ending their 33-year Stanley Cup drought, they'd better find a way to beat Martin Brodeur and the New Jersey Devils soon. Brodeur withstood Toronto's best period of the series and stopped 22 shots overall, and the Devils got three goals from their special teams in posting a 5-1 victory over the Maple Leafs on Monday night.
"We did a lot of stupid things early that we hadn't done in the first two games, and luckily, Marty kept us in it," coach Larry Robinson said after the Devils took a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven Eastern Conference semifinal series.
Jason Arnott, Scott Gomez, Patrik Elias, Petr Sykora and Alexander Mogilny scored, while Elias added two assists as New Jersey dominated for the third straight game.
New Jersey could easily have a 3-0 lead if Curtis Joseph hadn't stolen the opening game with a 32-save performance in a 2-1 Toronto victory.
"It's not over," Maple Leafs coach Pat Quinn said. "That's why they play seven games. Hopefully, we can scramble back."
Game 4 will also be played at New Jersey.
"Now we have to come back strong on Wednesday night," said Brodeur, who has allowed nine goals in seven playoffs games. "We don't want to have to go up to Toronto, knowing we have to win that game."
The Maple Leafs, who generated only a couple of scoring chances in the opening two games at home, had seven outstanding chances in the opening 20 minutes. Brodeur stopped odd-man rushes by Wendel Clark, Igor Korolev and Dmitri Khristich and some good close-in chances by Sergei Berezin and Adam Mair.
"I felt pretty good, I had to make a lot of big saves early," said Brodeur, who came within 4:17 of posting his second straight shutout. "You have to be in a zone in the playoffs."
The only shot Brodeur missed was a meaningless short-handed tally by Kevyn Adams with the game already decided.
Joseph was just as good at the other end for a period, stopping 14 shots. However, he never had a chance once New Jersey got rolling in the second period.
Mair picked up a four-minute high sticking penalty for cutting Daneyko and it only took the Devils 37 seconds to cash in. Sykora made a nice play getting the puck into the offensive zone and Arnott eventually tipped a Bobby Holik shot past Joseph from right in front of the crease at 9:42.
"When they scored on the first power play, it turned the tide and we weren't up to it after that," Quinn said.
Gomez, who was in danger of being benched for Game 2 despite his rookie of the year credentials, stretched the lead to 2-0 at 15:03. He beat Adams on a faceoff above the top of the circle, took a skate pass from Claude Lemieux and beat Joseph low to the glove side.
"We've showed that we can play when the score is close, a one goal game, but we also showed tonight that we can open things up when everybody is going," Gomez said. "The key guys came out tonight."
Elias, who led the Devils with 35 goals this season, made a great play to score short-handed 2:30 later. He intercepted a Korolev breakout pass at the Toronto blue line, skated right at Joseph and then went behind the net and scored on a wraparound.
Sykora put the game away at 4:27 of the final period with a tap-in goal set up by Arnott and Elias.
Mogilny closed out the scoring on a power play, putting the rebound of a Lemieux shot into an empty net.
"I'm not happy how we played," Quinn said. "Part of it was how well they played and part of it was we did not respond. In the third period we did not compete."
New Jersey outshot Toronto 14-2 in the third period, and 36-23 for the game.