Ryan: Charlie McAvoy willingly paid the price to put Bruins on brink of Eastern Conference Finals taken at TD Garden (2019 Stanley Cup Playoffs)

Adam Richins for BSJ

2019 Stanley Cup Playoffs

Ryan: Charlie McAvoy willingly paid the price to put Bruins on brink of Eastern Conference Finals

By Conor Ryan

May 5, 2019 • 2:34 am

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Charlie McAvoy considered himself “lucky” following Boston’s dramatic Game 5 triumph over the Blue Jackets at TD Garden.

A contest that, as David Backes so eloquently summarized — made sure that "anyone with cardiac problems certainly got tested" while watching. But for McAvoy, the aforementioned luck wasn’t in reference to his team, which relinquished a pair of two-goal leads in the final period of play but still managed to eke out a 4-3 victory.

Nor was said luck graced at his current condition, as McAvoy walked without much of a limp and tabbed himself as “fine” postgame — despite deflecting a howitzer by Artemi Panarin off of his skate with just 0.6 seconds left in regulation.

Rather, the 21-year-old defenseman felt fortune was on his side because he put himself in the way of Panarin’s rocket of a one-timer from just outside of the left circle. 

Even though David Pastrnak's second goal of the stanza put Boston back ahead with 1:28 left on the clock, a Blue Jackets club that managed to light the lamp three times in a span of 3:27 earlier in the third was ready to punch back — especially with Sergei Bobrovsky pulled in favor of an extra skater.

From the seconds following Pastrnak's strike, the Jackets managed to pepper Tuukka Rask with a pair of shots — including a bid from Cam Atkinson that was stymied by a mass of bodies crowding the crease. Another redirect by Matt Duchene didn’t count as a SOG, but only because the puck clanged off the post.




Sooner or later, puck luck had to swing back on the Blue Jackets’ side, right? And it appeared to be granted when
Brad Marchand
coughed up the biscuit to Duchene — who fed it to the lurking sniper in Panarin.


Without even a second available to react, McAvoy motioned to his right — sticking his foot out in a last-ditch effort to put at least something in front of Panarin’s rip.


“I wasn’t going to be able to get my stick out there,” McAvoy recalled. "




Don DelNegro




 “You want to leave your imprint on the game in any way possible and, like I said, I got lucky," McAvoy said. "I threw my body out there, and I was fortunate enough that it hit me. Whatever it takes, right?


"I think you put any person on our bench, I have complete faith that whoever it was out there is going to do that, is going to jump in the lane."




"It’s great plays, unbelievable," Torey Krug said. "What Chuck did there — it hurts to win." 




Brandon Carlo 


Gregory Campbell 


"It stings, but in a good way," McAvoy said his injury, adding, "That’s what it takes, and Butchy has been preaching that, and we all know that."


Bruce Cassidy






















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