Kris Letang scored the game-winning goal in Game 5 against the Flyers, beating Dan Vladar on a crazy bounce off the glass as the Penguins kept their season alive. It was Letang’s second straight game-winner, after he also delivered in Game 4.
“I just tried to put it there, obviously, made a crazy bounce,” Letang said after the game. “Sometimes, you create your own luck. It’s a good feeling. You want to help your team as best as you can, whether they go in with a perfect play or bank off the wall, doesn’t matter. They all count the same.”
The goal put Letang in rare company. He became the second defenseman in Stanley Cup Playoff history to score consecutive game-winning goals while facing elimination, joining J.C. Tremblay, who did it in Game 6 and Game 7 of the 1971 Quarterfinal. Letang also became the second-oldest player to score consecutive game-winning goals in playoff history. He turned 39 on April 24, and only Ron Francis was older when he did it in 2002 at 39 years and 63 days old.
The Penguins were trying to claw out of a 3-0 series deficit, and Letang had been logging heavy minutes while providing offense at key moments. Sidney Crosby kept driving the attack around him. He scored a power-play goal off a set faceoff play in the first period of Game 4, then set up Letang’s second-period winner in that game. In Game 5, Crosby picked up primary assists on two of Pittsburgh’s three goals, including Connor Dewar’s second-period goal.
Coach Dan Muse said Letang’s latest surge was no surprise. “He’s a big-time competitor,” Muse said. He added that what people do not see is “the way that he prepares, the way he takes care of himself, his day-to-day at this time of year,” calling him “a guy who’s been doing it for a long time and at a high level.”
That fits a player who had an inconsistent regular season before elevating his game in the playoffs. Letang said the details matter, from a good read to a shot with time to pick the spot. He said Crosby’s play on the sequence showed “how much IQ he has on the ice,” and how he knows what to do in every situation. For Pittsburgh, the message was simple: its longest-serving defenseman and its captain were still finding ways to pull the team forward when the margin for error was gone.
The Flyers entered the game with Vladar in net after his strong season had already been charted in earlier coverage, and this time his name was tied to a bounce that went Pittsburgh’s way. For the Penguins, Game 5 did not erase the hole they had dug. It did, however, prove that with Letang and Crosby producing at critical moments, they were not going quietly.