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PHILADELPHIA - Peter Laviolette never saw the overtime goal. He wasn’t alone.
Hardly anyone at the Wachovia Center, including some Chicago players, knew the Blackhawks had won the Stanley Cup in overtime Wednesday.
“I saw one of their players come across the blueline like they’ve won something,” the coach of the Philadelphia Flyers said. “I got a little pit in my stomach.
“But I didn’t know it went in. I haven’t seen it.”
Neither have most of the people at the sold-out arena.
Patrick Kane’s goal, seen by Kane and definitely not seen by Philadelphia goalie Michael Leighton and hardly anyone else, gave the Blackhawks the National Hockey League championship in what was one of the strangest endings in Stanley Cup history, followed by a delayed reaction celebration.
“I shot it, I saw it go through his legs, I knew it was in right away,” said Kane, of his overtime goal at 4:06 of the first overtime period.
He rushed past Kimmo Timonen, made an excellent play, but shuffled the puck at Leighton, who seemed to have twisted his body in the odd-angle shot. He twisted it so much he couldn’t stop the puck.
Kane saw the puck go in but the red light never came on, his own teammates weren’t sure and it took a very brief instant replay to determine the series was over.
“I tried to sell the celebration a bit and I think a few guys were still iffy but I saw the coaches jumping around. It’s pretty surreal right now.”
Kane then reflected on the kind of season it was for him, going back to his problems in Buffalo with a taxi driver last August which he chose to address Wednesday night.
“It didn’t start out pretty good back in August,” Kane said.
“You go through those things as a kid, you try to better yourself as a person. There was some ups and downs. I thought, though, I had a pretty good year as far as the Olympics, and then you win the Stanley Cup. That’s pretty special.
“To see how things could from so bad to so good, it’s kind of unbelievable.”
steve.simmons@sunmedia.ca