Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)

Holtby’s playoff dominance goes beyond ‘ the save’

- By StephenWhy­no

ARLINGTON, VA. » Alex Ovechkin covered his eyes with his gloved hands in disbelief. Barry Trotz hid his disbelief inside.

Chandler Stephenson had the perfect view and didn’t like the odds. The net was wide open and Braden Holtby reached his stick across and stopped Alex Tuch’s shot in the final minutes to save the game.

“I thought, ‘ Oh, no, no, no,’” Stephenson said. “And then his paddle was there and he made the save and I just couldn’t believe it.”

Holtby’s unbelievab­le move might go down as one of themost important moments in Stanley Cup history. It allowed theWashing­ton Capitals to even the final against the Vegas Golden Knights and served as further evidence of Holtby’s dominant playoff run.

Most of the buzz going into the Cup Final surrounded Vegas goaltender Marc- Andre Fleury, a deserved Conn Smythe favorite who already has two championsh­ip rings. But Holtby stole the show in making 37 saves in Game 2 and returned to his career- long playoff dominance after allowing five goals on 33 shots in a Game 1 that was far from goalie- friendly. It’s the kind of play his Capitals teammates have come to expect this time of year.

“The guy’s just a machine,” defenseman Matt Niskanen said. “Boy, has he been good. Making the saves that he’s supposed to make look really routine and he’s made some game changers— none better than the one with a couple minutes left in Game 2.” Holtby is not impressed. Trotz has watched “the save” a handful of times, and Holtby has analyzed it but believes “there’s a lotmore saves that I’vemade even these two games that I like a lot more than that one.” The laserfocus­ed 2016 Vezina Trophy winner is far more worried about how to not need to make that desperate of a stop in Game 3 Saturday night and beyond.

“You hope that next time you get more of your body behind it and give it less chance of going in,” Holtby said Friday. “You try and find little areas where you can limit the chance of the puck going in instead of just hoping it doesn’t.”

The 28- year- old doesn’t make saves on hope. Since he made his NHL playoff debut as a rookie in 2012, Holtby has a 2.04 goalsagain­st average and .929 save percentage — fourth- and secondbest all- time among goalies with at least 50 games of experience.

In other words, Holtby is no one- save pony. In these playoffs, he’s 13- 7 with a 2.19 GAA and .921 save percentage since replacing Philipp Grubauer in Game 2 of the first round.

“Thank God he’s our goalie,” Ovechkin said. “He’s over there when we need him.”

Holtby wasn’t where he needed to be in February, when he had a stretch of 11 games in which he allowed 41 goals and took some time off to “reset.” He worked with goaltendin­g coach Scott Murray on some technical adjustment­s, got hismind right and has felt a noticeable change since.

“It was more a mental thing,” Holtby said. “Every year’s different, every situation, and I was just getting to a point where I was seeing the play one step ahead of it instead of waiting for it to come, and just being a little bit more patient and expecting the unexpected.”

It doesn’t getmore unexpected than the weird bounce late in ARLINGTON, VA. » Evgeny Kuznetsov was on the ice for Washington Capitals practice Friday, 36 hours after leaving Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Final against the Vegas Golden Knights clutching his left arm in pain.

Kuznetsov did not return to Wednesday night’s game, and coach Barry Trotz had no fur ther update other than to say Washington’s leading scorer is day- to- day. Kuznetsov’s status for Game 3 Saturday night is still not clear.

Defenseman Brooks Orpik, who took a slash to the hand late in Game 2, did not participat­e in the optional practice, along with Alex Ovechkin, T. J. Oshie and others. Trotz says Orpik is fine.

Goaltender Braden Holtby, who stopped 37 of 39 shots in Game 2 to even the series, was on the ice as part of his regular routine. Holtby has continued his career- long playoff success this spring, going 13- 7 with a 2.19 goals- against average and .921 save percentage.

 ?? JOHN LOCHER — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS ?? Washington goaltender Braden Holtby, center, makes a stick save on a shot by Vegas’ Alex Tuch, left, as John Carlson watches during the third period in Game 2of the Stanley Cup Final on Wednesday in Las Vegas.
JOHN LOCHER — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Washington goaltender Braden Holtby, center, makes a stick save on a shot by Vegas’ Alex Tuch, left, as John Carlson watches during the third period in Game 2of the Stanley Cup Final on Wednesday in Las Vegas.

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