Devils delay Kings’ Stanley Cup clincher
LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Kings only needed one last win to scratch a 45- year- old itch.
With a victory in Game 4 of the Stanley Cup finals, a longstruggling franchise would have matched the most dominant playoff run in NHL history. The largest crowd in their history could have watched the Kings raise the Cup for the very first time in an arena packed with past Kings heroes, Hollywood celebrities and faithful fans waiting since 1967 for this one cathartic moment.
Yep, the New Jersey Devils crashed quite a party Wednesday night.
Adam Henrique scored the tiebreaking goal with 4: 29 to play, Martin Brodeur made 21 saves, and New Jersey beat the Kings 3- 1 to avoid a sweep in the finals.
The Devils have never been swept in a best- of- seven series, managing at least one victory 43 times. They weren’t going out that way at Staples Center, not even with every force in Los Angeles seemingly stacked against them.
The NHL unpacked the Stanley Cup deep inside the arena before the third period, but it never saw the ice.
“We’re pretty happy to live another day, there’s no doubt about that,” Brodeur said. “We just wanted to play well, give
everything we had, and see where that’s going to bring us.”
It’s bringing them back to Newark for Game 5 on Saturday night.
After making a series of stunning saves in a performance that evoked his greatest moments, Brodeur said he believes in the Devils’ comeback chances “more than yesterday.”
“You know, I think we wanted to make them jump on a plane and come to New Jersey,” said Brodeur, who stopped Simon Gagne and Trevor Lewis on his two biggest saves. “We had to go anyway. Might as well get a game over there.”
Patrik Elias and Ilya Kovalchuk also scored third- period goals for the Eastern Conference champion Devils, who prevented Los Angeles from equaling Edmonton’s 16- 2 run through the 1988 postseason — back in the days of a 21- team league, and with five future Hall of Famers on the Oilers’ roster.
“We stayed alive,” said Elias, who has two of the Devils’ five goals in the series. “Marty had to work hard, but he gave us a chance. All we’ve got to do is keep playing hard.”
The Devils felt they should have ended that run earlier in this series, but got no breaks in the first three games.
They got a big break of their own creation in the third period of Game 4.
A few minutes after Drew Doughty tied it for the Kings, Henrique scored his third enormous goal of the postseason, taking a pass from David Clarkson and rocketing a wrist shot past Jonathan Quick, the Kings’ nearly unbeatable goalie.
The Calder Trophy finalist ended two of the Devils’ first three playoff series with overtime goals, and he kept New Jersey alive with his latest.
“It’s fun. This is where every kid dreams of playing one day,” Henrique said. “We know it’s going to be a tough task to come back, ( but) there’s no quit in the group in here. We know we can do it. We know we can put four together and come back.”
Quick stopped 21 shots for the Kings, but lost his streak of nearly 139 shutout minutes right when he probably could have wrapped up the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP. The Kings had allowed just one third- period goal in their previous nine games.