Canes eliminate Devils, advance to conference final on Fast's OT winner
Jesper Fast scored the winning goal just over seven minutes into overtime as the Carolina Hurricanes ended the New Jersey Devils' season with a 3-2 victory in Game 5 of their second-round series Thursday night.
🔴 THE SERIES WINNER ⚫️
— NHL (@NHL) May 12, 2023
Jesper Fast has the screen in front and scores the overtime winner to send the @Canes to the Eastern Conference Final! #StanleyCup pic.twitter.com/bG68VNEYWz
The Hurricanes will face either the Florida Panthers or Toronto Maple Leafs in the Eastern Conference Final. The Panthers lead that second-round series 3-1.
Carolina is the first team to reach the conference finals in these playoffs. The Canes defeated the New York Islanders in six games in the first round.
Fast's winner was his fifth tally of this postseason and came on the power play. He became the fourth player in franchise history to score multiple overtime goals in a single playoff, joining Jordan Staal, Niclas Wallin, and Cory Stillman.
Devils star Jack Hughes wasn't interested in using his team's relative youth as an excuse for losing the series.
"I don't think it matters about a young team or whatever, they just played better than us," Hughes said, according to team reporter Amanda Stein. "We're a competitive group, and we wanted to go deeper."
He also didn't use his health as an excuse. Devils head coach Lindy Ruff said postgame that Hughes played through an injury Thursday night, per the Star-Ledger's Ryan Novozinsky. The forward, who turns 22 on Sunday, didn't take line rushes in the warmup and logged only 14:16 of ice time. Ruff said they'll reveal the details of Hughes' injury soon.
The Hurricanes last made the conference final in 2018-19, when the Boston Bruins swept them before losing the Stanley Cup Final to the St. Louis Blues in seven. Carolina has made five straight postseasons. The Canes last won the Cup in 2005-06 when they triumphed over the Edmonton Oilers in seven.
New Jersey made the playoffs this spring for the first time since 2017-18 when the Tampa Bay Lightning bounced them out of the first round in five. The Devils vanquished their archrivals, the New York Rangers, in seven games in the opening round of this postseason.