by Bob Herpen
The Phanatic Magazine
Simon Gagne registered the game-deciding power- play goal with 7:08 left in regulation as the Philadelphia Flyers etched their names in the NHL record book with a 4-3 victory over the Boston Bruins in Game 7 of their Eastern Conference semifinal series.
Philadelphia, which stared down the barrel of a three-games-to-none series deficit, rallied back to win the final four games of the set and became the first team since the 1975 New York Islanders to win a postseason series when trailing 3-0.
Only two other teams in professional sports have rallied to win despite facing such a deficit -- the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs and 2004 Boston Red Sox.
The Flyers clinched their trip to the conference finals by doing it the hard way, as they climbed back from a 3-0 first-period hole. James van Riemsdyk, Scott Hartnell and Danny Briere all scored to erase Boston's advantage.
A victory for the ages, it also marked the first time Philly rallied from a three-goal margin to win in a series-clinching contest since it took the 1974 quarterfinals against the Atlanta Flames with an overtime decision in Game 4.
Ville Leino added a pair of assists for the seventh-seeded Flyers, who open up the next round at home on Sunday against the eighth-seeded Montreal Canadiens.
It will mark the first time since the current playoff format was adopted in 1994 that the lowest two seeds in either conference will vie for a trip to the Stanley Cup Finals.
Michael Leighton was beaten three times in the opening period but finished with 22 stops for Philadelphia, which improved to 8-6 all-time in Game 7s and has won its last two ultimate games on the road.
Milan Lucic tallied twice and Michael Ryder once for the Bruins, who failed in their quest to reach the conference finals for the first time since 1992 in a failure of epic proportions.
Tuukka Rask allowed four goals on 27 shots in defeat for Boston, which suffered the loss one year to the day of a 3-2 overtime setback against Carolina in a Game 7 at home in the Eastern semis.
Gagne registered his fourth goal of the postseason on a Flyers advantage, thanks to a bench minor penalty on the Bruins for too many men on the ice. That came with 8:50 to play in regulation.
Leino cycled the puck behind the Boston net and fed to Mike Richards in the right circle. His intended centering pass deflected off a body in front, where Gagne gathered and flicked it high into the net inside the left post to give the visitors a 4-3 advantage.
Leighton was not seriously tested for the remainder of the contest, but was the beneficiary of a shot that skittered off the post with six minutes left. He also stymied Lucic's bid for the hat trick on a quick pad save with 3:50 to play.
Expert forechecking pressure kept the puck deep in the Bruins' zone and Rask was not able to get to the bench for an extra attacker until 1:07 remained. The Flyers cleared the zone three times down the stretch and the home team was powerless to prevent the inevitable.
Things looked significantly brighter for Boston in the early going.
The Bruins were awarded the game's first power play and made the Flyers pay only eight seconds into it when Ryder one-timed the rebound of a Zdeno Chara shot past Leighton at the right post at 5:27.
It was 2-0 at 9:02 on the following Boston advantage. Dennis Wideman carried down the right wing and when Flyers defenseman Matt Carle failed to check him, he was able to slip away and dish across for Lucic for a tap-in from the left side.
Despite almost a minute of offensive pressure from Philly with six minutes left in the first period, the Bruins broke out on an odd-man rush which saw Lucic finish off a 2-on-1 by pumping a shot through Leighton's pads at 14:10 for a 3-0 contest.
Van Riemsdyk, though, picked up his first career playoff tally with 2:48 to play in the first as his shot trickled through Rask from the slot.
Hartnell cut the Flyers' deficit to 3-2 at 2:49 of the second period, when he followed up a spinning chance by Leino and lifted a precision backhander over a prone Rask and under the crossbar from a sharp angle.
Briere then knotted the game at 8:39, when he circled behind the Bruins' net from right to left and banked a shot off the stick and backside of defenseman Matt Hunwick and into a half-open cage.
A tense moment occurred with just over five minutes to play, when a puck that sailed high in the air above Rask settled in the crease amidst a scrum of players.
The initial call on the ice was no goal, and although one replay seemed to show the disc on edge and over the goal line, a lengthy review determined the shot was not successful. Despite the setback, the teams were knotted, 3-3, after two periods.
Philadelphia nearly jumped out to the lead roughly four minutes into the third, but Chris Pronger's blistering point drive clanged off the crossbar.
NOTES: Gagne has posted all four of his goals in the last four games...Lucic recorded his first career multi-goal playoff game...Chara, the Bruins' captain, fell to 0-5 in Game 7s...The Flyers improved to 3-3 all-time on road in Game 7s, while the Bruins fell to 9-6 all-time at home in Game 7s...Boston also fell to 9-10 overall in Game 7s, and have failed in their last four tests in this situation, having not won since defeating Montreal to win a 1994 Eastern Conference quarterfinal series...Philadelphia has now won three of the five postseason series with Boston...The Flyers and Canadiens last played for a trip to the Cup Finals in 1989, a series which saw Montreal advance with a six-game triumph...The Flyers took a six-game decision in the 1987 Wales Conference finals from the Habs who were then the defending Cup champions.
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