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Round 3 Game 4
Blackhawks 1 @ Canucks 2
(Vancouver wins series 4-0)
P.K. Subban, who's been relatively quiet offensively all playoffs, opens the scoring in the first on a fourth line shift. It was incredibly tight defensively in the first, with the Canucks mustering only six shots and Chicago only four. In the second things opened up a bit and eventually Andrew Shaw beat Markstrom for the equalizer. In a fairly locked down third period which looked like it could head to overtime, the Canucks third line had an attacking zone shift where Bozak dug out a puck and moved it to Brunner, who sent it to Muzzin on the point for the one timer goal past Crawford! Things got chippy at the end, with Bertuzzi and a frustrated Toews exchanging slashes, and Vancouver would hold on to win it. A year ago they were swept by the Blackhawks in the conference finals, tonight they completed the sweep to get back into the Finals. It's a good day for an exorcism! Third pairing defenseman Shawn Lalonde had a decent defensive game for the Hawks, with 4 blocks, three hits and a takeaway in sixteen minutes. Besides his goal, P.K. Subban had a block, a hit and six shots on net in twenty five minutes.
Red Wings 3 @ Rangers 1
(Detroit leads series 3-1)
In the first period it was Tomas Tatar who opened the scoring (his 7th of the postseason) on a play from Meszaros and Datsyuk. The lead was extended by Darren Helm's first of the playoffs (from Zetterberg and Kronwall) in the second frame. Ryan Callahan drew the Blueshirts to within one (Gaborik, Sauer) before the period ended. Abdelkader took an ill advised slashing penalty for the Rangers at the close of the period though, and Riley Sheahan scored his eighth on the ensuing powerplay (Nielsen, Porter) to give Detroit some insurance. They wouldn't need it, playing solid defense and seeing good netminding for Petr Mrazek, who finished the night with 33 saves as Detroit moves to within one game of the Stanley Cup Finals. Kronwall had an awesome night, going plus two with an assist, a shot, three blocks, three hits and a takeaway in twenty four minutes on the ice. Nyquist was held off the scoreboard but still managed five shots on goal, a hit and two takeaways. Callahan had a goal, three shots and five hits for New York. Gaborik had eight shot attempts (five on goal) an assist and a hit. Andrej Meszaros left the game with an upper body injury and the prognosis is not good - he is expected to miss the rest of the players and probably the start of next season as well recovering from a ruptured tendon in his arm.
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