With four games tied 2-2, four teams got the win and will get the first chance to move on in their series.
Missed anything? Here’s a recap of the night’s action.
Hurricanes stomp Bruins 5-1 to take series lead
Home ice seems to be everything in this series, or at least that’s what it looks like through the first five games. The Boston Bruins seemed to have all the momentum going into Game 5 after back-to-back wins in Boston, but the Carolina Hurricanes sucked all that momentum back into their favor just six minutes in with a goal from Jaccob Slavin.
Tony DeAngelo also got his response in to the recently rising rivalry between himself and Brad Marchand, scoring on a power play in the first to make it 2-0.
Seth Jarvis also had quite the performance for the Hurricanes, as his two-goal game helped increase the lead to 4-0. Boston would get one back, but both Vincent Trocheck and Teuvo Teravainen would cap off their three point nights to give the Canes the 5-1, with Trocheck scoring and Teravainen getting the secondary assist. With the Canes win, the Bruins now face elimination going back to Boston.
Leafs superstars show up in comeback win
It seemed like the same old for the Toronto Maple Leafs at the start of Game 5, as the Lightning were up 2-0 only 6:11 into the first period. But after their big guns faced a lot of criticism for their performance in Tampa Bay, they all chipped in to make the comeback happen. John Tavares, Morgan Rielly, William Nylander and Auston Matthews all scored in the 4-3 win, while Mitch Marner set up Matthews’ winner with a shot off of Andrei Vasilevskiy’s pads. For a deeper dive into the game, Matt Larkin has you covered here.
Tarasenko hat trick gives Blues series lead
It was a battle of the snipers for the St. Louis Blues and the Minnesota Wild in Game 5, but the Blues’ sharpshooter prevailed. After Ryan O’Reilly opened the scoring, Kirill Kaprizov got two on the power play in the first period to give the Wild a 2-1 lead.
From there, it was all Blues. Brandon Saad tied the game in the second period, but it was the play of Vladimir Tarasenko in the third that gave the Blues the win, as the natural hat trick would be the difference in a 5-2 win, including the first two goals coming 68 seconds apart to make it 4-2.
Kings blow late 4-2 lead, but win in OT to take series lead
After a quiet couple of games for Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, or at least by their standards, the Edmonton Oilers’ dynamic duo showed up in a big way in Game 5. But it wasn’t enough to complete the comeback, as they fell in overtime to the Los Angeles Kings.
Between McDavid and Draisaitl, they contributed to every goal in the game for the Oilers. McDavid assisted on Zach Kassian’s second period goal to tie the game 1-1. Draisaitl would get the secondary assist on McDavid’s goal to cut the Kings 3-1 lead in half. Draisaitl would then score two goals in two and a half minutes to tie the game, with McDavid setting up the game tying goal.
But, the Kings would just get a little bit more depth scoring to put them over the top. Defenseman Troy Stecher had the opening goal and set up the game winning goal. Andreas Athanasiou would get his first goal of the playoffs, against his old team to boot, to make it 3-1. Phillip Danault would get the 4-2 goal in a game where he matched up against McDavid. And Adrian Kempe would have a three-point night of his own, scoring the second goal for the Kings, and getting the overtime goal in the 5-4 win.
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