Stanley Cup Playoffs Day 25: Pickard stops 19 in playoff debut as Oilers tie series

The Florida Panthers had a chance to advance to the Conference Finals while Calvin Pickard looked to win in his playoff debut during Tuesday’s playoff action.

Bruins keep season alive with 2-1 win in Game 5

Much like Game 4, the Boston Bruins were without Brad Marchand in the lineup, and also like Game 4, they preserved early without him. The Bruins didn’t even wait five minutes before jumping up to a 1-0 lead this time, with Morgan Geekie burying the opening goal. But this time, they couldn’t get that 2-0 goal in the first.

That proved to be costly, as early in the second period, Sam Reinhart responded to tie the game for the Florida Panthers. However, the Bruins bounced back quickly, as only four minutes later, Charlie McAvoy gave the Bruins the go-ahead goal again, and while it was looked at for goalie interference from Danton Heinen, it was ruled a good goal.

MCAVOY GETS THE BRUINS LEAD BACK 🚀 pic.twitter.com/GSFdHwjNRx

— B/R Open Ice (@BR_OpenIce) May 15, 2024

The Panthers attempted to get the tying goal in the third period, but the Bruins stifled them to just 0.17 expected goals at 5v5 and 0.98 overall. The Bruins didn’t even need a tying goal, and they went on to win the game 2-1. McAvoy had points on both goals, Jeremy Swayman stopped 28 of 29 shots for the win, while Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 26 of 28 in the loss.

Canucks tie late, Oilers go ahead even later to even series

The big story of this series between the Vancouver Canucks and Edmonton Oilers going into Game 4 was, of course, the goaltending. Stuart Skinner’s performance just hasn’t been good enough for the team in front of him, so Pickard now finds himself in the crease for the first time in a playoff game.

The Oilers got off to an excellent start. First, they opened the scoring midway through the opening period courtesy of a Leon Draisaitl power play goal. It remained that way until late in the second when Ryan Nugent-Hopkins added to the lead off of an odd-man rush with 40 seconds left. After 40 minutes, it was 2-0 Oilers.

But Vancouver has come back from bigger leads in these playoffs and even this series, so this wasn’t a problem. Conor Garland made it a one-goal game before the seven-minute mark, and while the Canucks still had plenty of time to tie it, they took their sweet time to do so. In fact, there was only 1:41 left in the game when Brock Boeser evened up the game at two-a-piece.

Now, we needed overti – wait, what? Evan Bouchard scored 62 seconds later to give the Oilers the lead again? That’s right, the defenseman scored his second game-winning goal of the series with just 39 seconds left, and just as quickly as Vancouver tied it, Edmonton regained the lead and took the game 3-2.

evan bouchard calls game four. pic.twitter.com/E9l6nM7N5K

— zach (@zjlaing) May 15, 2024

With that, the series is now tied, and they return to Vancouver with what has now become a best of three series. Draisaitl and Bouchard both finished the night with two points, while Pickard made 19 saves to get his first career playoff win.