- Jackson Blake scored at 5:31 of overtime to give Carolina a 3-2 win and complete a Game 4 sweep of Philadelphia
- The Hurricanes are 8-0 in the playoffs, just the fifth team in NHL history to start a postseason that hot
- Read below for the Blake winner, Taylor Hall’s three-assist night, and how Carolina punched its ticket to the Eastern Conference Final
Jackson Blake punched Carolina’s ticket to the Eastern Conference Final.
The Hurricanes winger took a Taylor Hall feed in the slot at 5:31 of overtime, fired a wrist shot off Dan Vladar’s glove, and watched it trickle over the goal line for a 3-2 Game 4 win that swept the Philadelphia Flyers out of the second round Saturday at Xfinity Mobile Arena. Carolina is now 8-0 in the playoffs, the fifth team in NHL history to start a postseason that hot.
Watch the OT winner that ended the series:
Blake finished with two goals and an assist. Hall stacked three helpers and now has fingerprints on every late-game moment of this series after his own OT winner in Game 2.
Carolina trailed early. Tyson Foerster opened scoring 7:50 into the first, lifting a wrister over Frederik Andersen’s left pad for his first point in 10 playoff games.
An equalizer came 12:35 into the second. Blake’s shot from outside the right circle clipped Flyers defenseman Jamie Drysdale on the way through and beat Vladar.
Mark Jankowski looked to put the Canes ahead a few minutes later, but Philadelphia challenged for goaltender interference and the goal came off the board.
Logan Stankoven gave the Hurricanes the lead 4:13 into the third on a tic-tac-toe sequence that started with Blake breaking the puck out and Hall feeding Stankoven streaking down the middle.
Alex Bump answered 1:39 later, hammering home a one-timer after Travis Konecny knocked K’Andre Miller off the puck behind the Carolina net.
Andersen finished with 15 saves. Vladar stopped 37 at the other end and was the only reason this thing reached overtime in the first place.
Here are the full Game 4 highlights:
The win mirrors Carolina’s first-round sweep of Ottawa. The Hurricanes will face the winner of Sabres-Canadiens in the Eastern Conference Final.
Hall has the OT helper to go with his Game 2 dagger, and the Stankoven-Hall-Blake line keeps showing up in the biggest moments of this run.
