NHL Playoffs: Maple Leafs rally, Kings clip Oilers in OT, Hurricanes and Blues win
Anthony Scultore
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The NHL Playoffs continue to provide hockey fans with incredible action. On May 10, 2022, we saw the Toronto Maple Leafs, L.A. Kings, St. Louis Blues, and Carolina Hurricanes all take 3-2 series leads.
In Toronto, Auston Matthews completed a rally to lift the Maple Leafs in their opening round best-of-seven series against the Tampa Bay Lightning. The Carolina Hurricanes bounced back against the Boston Bruins to keep home-ice advantage.
Over in the West, the St. Louis Blues thanks to a hat-trick from Vladimir Tarasenko beat the Minnesota Wild. And finally, Adrian Kempe’s OT tally has put the Edmonton Oilers on the brink of elimination.
All four teams can close out their series on Thursday night.
Maple Leafs 4 vs Lightning 3
Auston Matthews scored the go-ahead goal in the third period and Toronto rallied past visiting Tampa Bay to take a 3-2 lead in a first-round Eastern Conference playoff series.
“That felt good,” Matthews said. “Just the crowd, the energy, there’s nothing like a playoff atmosphere especially here in Toronto. It was pretty special. It was a big win for us but there’s still some work to be done. It’s a good night just to battle back down two goals, never losing hope and just competing but like I said, the job is not done.”
NHL.com
William Nylander had a goal and two assists for the Maple Leafs. John Tavares added a goal and an assist, and Morgan Rielly also scored. Toronto’s Jack Campbell had a solid game in goal with some big saves among the 32 shots he stopped.
Steven Stamkos, Victor Hedman and Ryan McDonagh scored for the Lightning. Nikita Kucherov added two assists and Andrei Vasilevskiy made 21 saves for Tampa Bay.
Hurricanes 5, Bruins 1
Seth Jarvis scored twice and Carolina moved one win away from advancing to the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs by beating Boston in Raleigh, N.C.
“You love seeing that from a young kid that comes in and earns his way in the League and earns his way up the chart in every aspect of the game,” coach Rod Brind’Amour said about Jarvis. “I can’t say enough good things about him.”
Vincent Trocheck and Tony DeAngelo had a goal and two assists and Teuvo Teravainen had three assists for the Hurricanes, who lead the best-of-seven series 3-2. Antti Raanta made 33 saves. Sebastian Aho had two assists to reach 40 career playoff points, moving past Rod Brind’Amour and Ron Francis into sole possession of second place in franchise history.
Connor Clifton scored and Jeremy Swayman made 33 saves for the Bruins.
Kings 5 vs Oilers 4 (OT)
Adrian Kempe scored two goals, including the game-winner 1:12 into overtime, to give the visiting Los Angeles Kings a 5-4 victory over the Edmonton Oilers in Game 5 of their first-round Western Conference playoff series on Tuesday night.
Kempe, who also had an assist, took control of the puck in the neutral zone and then rushed up the right wing and cut inside a diving Duncan Keith and slid a forehand shot around the right pad of goaltender Mike Smith for the game-winner.
Phillip Danault, Troy Stecher and Andreas Athanasiou also scored goals for Los Angeles, which took a 3-2 lead in the best-of-seven series. Kings goalie Jonathan Quick made 24 saves while making his 90th consecutive playoff start.
Leon Draisaitl had two goals and an assist, Connor McDavid had a goal and two assists and Zack Kassian also scored for Edmonton. Smith finished with 38 saves.
“It’s disappointing,” McDavid said via NHL.com. “Obviously, you never like to lose, but they give you seven games for a reason and we need to go get one on the road and bring it back to Edmonton.”
Blues 5 vs Wild 2
Vladimir Tarasenko scored three goals, all in the third period, to lead visiting St. Louis to a win against Minnesota in Game 5 of their Western Conference first-round playoff series in Saint Paul, Minn.
“Happy to win,” Tarasenko said. “Obviously, happy to score, I’m not going to lie, but more happy to win.”
Ryan O’Reilly scored for the third straight game, Brandon Saad also scored and Jordan Binnington made 30 saves for the Blues, who took a 3-2 series lead.
Kirill Kaprizov scored two power-play goals to give him seven tallies in the series for the Wild, who were leading 2-1 midway through the game. Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 27 shots in the defeat.
–Field Level Media contributed to this report