Who? Fates of some NHL teams in hands of role players
Casey DeSmith keeps insisting the NHL playoffs are no different than any other game he’s ever played in his life.
The Pittsburgh goaltender believes his job when he skates onto the ice at Madison Square Garden ice on Tuesday night when the Penguins open their first-round matchup with the New York Rangers is no different than it is at any other time of the season, at any other time of his hockey life.
Stop the puck when it comes your way. Keep your team in it. Don’t let one mistake morph into another. Pour everything you can into making sure you’re not on the wrong side of the post-series handshake line.
To DeSmith, it doesn’t matter that he hasn’t appeared in a postseason game in five years, when 3,608 people watched his Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins fall to the Providence Bruins in Game 5 of the first round of the 2017 AHL playoffs. It’s still just hockey. Right?
“I think as soon as you start to try and make it bigger than it is, problems start to happen mentally,” he said.
It’s a great approach — in theory. Yet when the puck drops, especially if it’s your first foray into the unique crucible that the playoffs provide, it is different. At least at first blush.
“Those first 10 minutes sometimes feel like it’s the fastest game you’ve ever played in your life,” Nashville veteran defenseman Roman Josi said. “After that, you kind of settle in and you just play hockey and I think that’s important in the playoffs.”
DeSmith is hardly the only player improbably thrust into the spotlight as the chase for the Stanley Cup begins. Both conferences feature players with unremarkable resumes who could have an outsize impact on the outcome.
An injury to top goaltender Frederik Andersen forced Metropolitan Division champion Carolina to turn to Antti Raanta. Raanta shined in a 5-1 win over Boston on Monday night, but if he struggles at some point, rookie Pyotr Kochetkov (3-0 regular season) is the Hurricanes’ next option.
Then again, maybe…
Source : yahoo
