ANAHEIM — Three six-on-five goals. Have you ever…?
Put aside for a moment the growing issues that the National Hockey League has with its definition of goaltender interference, and the wonky review system that goes with it. Game 5 in Anaheim Friday night was one for the ages, a historic Ducks comeback/Oilers choke job that stretched to 11:38 p.m. Pacific time Friday night, leaving Easterners in a state of disbelief when they awoke to headlines declaring the Ducks winners.
In the NHL’s 100-year history, never before has a team rallied from a 3-0 deficit with less than four minutes remaining in a playoff game to win — ironically erasing the previous winner from the playoff ledgers: The night of April 20, 1997 when Kelly Buchberger’s OT winner capped Edmonton’s late comeback from being down 3-0 against Dallas.
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The theme around the Oilers this spring has been about a young, inexperienced team learning what the post-season is all about after a decade away. On a Saturday morning where both the general manager and head coach were very pragmatic about Rickard Rakell’s controversial tying goal with 15 seconds to play, looking past a blown 3-0 lead to identify the learning experience wasn’t so easy.
“It doesn’t really feel great right now, (but) I’ve seen resilience,” general manager Peter Chiarelli said of his club. “These are trying times when you get games like last night, and Game 4. You see the younger guys playing under duress. You see them making a lot of plays and mistakes. And I know in two, three years I’m going to look back on this and say that was great for us.
“I know that — 100 per cent certain. It’s just hard to make that determination now.”
Though the Oilers finally earned their way into the post-season after a record-tying 10 years on the outside, the hockey gods — and the NHL’s Situation Room — have given them the rookie treatment this spring.
A key goalie interference challenge in Game 4 was turned down, and the subsequent loss of Edmonton’s timeout left the Oilers unable to challenge a clear offside moments later on the Ducks’ second goal of the game.
In Game 5, the collapse was completed when, with 15 seconds left in a 3-2 game, Ryan Kesler appeared to be holding goalie Cam Talbot’s leg in the crease as Rackell slid the puck five-hole. The league ruled it a good goal, and Oilers fans have been apoplectic in their reaction.
“There is a frustration level building but it’s really not because anything the NHL hockey ops does,” Chiarelli said. “It’s not because of the process. It’s because the calls have gone against us.
“I know the process (the referees and the people in the Situation Room) go through, and I have discussions after the fact with NHL hockey ops – (though he hasn’t) had one yet based on last night. But we as GMs have voted this stuff in, and there’s a group that reviews these things. They came through with a ruling and unfortunately the last two have gone against us.”
The good news?
Edmonton persevered through numerous injuries on defence in Game 5, and had a gutsy win in their pockets at Honda Center before the giant collapse. They believe they’ll win Game 6 on Sunday night in Edmonton, and Oilers captain Connor McDavid as much as guaranteed it when he said after Game 5 in Anaheim, “We’ll be back here Wednesday.”
“You like when your leader says that,” said McLellan. “Now you have to go out and do it.”
Chiarelli was part of one of these games as the general manager of the Boston Bruins when, on May 13, 2013, the Bruins became the first ever team to win a Game 7 when trailing by three goals in the third period. The Bruins trailed 4-1 halfway through the third, and won 5-4 in overtime.
“Well, (that game felt) a little different,” he said. “(That) was Game 7. It was most of the period — you could see from the 10-minute mark of the period on, the momentum changing. (Friday) night wasn’t like that.
“Certainly I didn’t see a real huge momentum change last night. I saw us getting hemmed in in the last three minutes and for a number of reasons we couldn’t get the puck out. It was a tough loss to take but these series, anything can happen, as you’ve seen. We just have to get back on our horse.”
Oilers winger Milan Lucic was on that Boston squad in ‘13. “That was a Game 7,” he said. “The good thing here is, we have a chance to come back.”
Maybe this series is simply destined for Game 7. Perhaps, even if the Oilers hang on to win Game 5, Anaheim continues the trend of road wins in Game 6 and the series closes out at Disneyland anyhow.
Now, this Edmonton “growth team” that was supposed to simply be here for the experience, gets to live out an elimination game Sunday afternoon, in a 5 p.m. MT start at Rogers Place.
“We know what’s at stake. You don’t have to have a lot of experience to figure that out. You have to come and play,” McLellan said. “The one thing that our players will be told, and will need to understand, is that you don’t have to win two games (on Sunday).
“You only have to win one.”