Today marks the 15th anniversary of one of the most — and few — memorable Flyers playoff moments in recent history: “The Shift.”
Happy anniversary, all!
Picture it, May 24, 2010. It was a balmy 70 degrees in South Philadelphia that night. Barack Obama was president, it was Bob Dylan’s 69th birthday, and it was the 75th anniversary of Major League Baseball’s first night game, featuring the Cincinnati Reds and Philadelphia Phillies.
The Flyers were taking on the Montreal Canadiens in Game 5 of the 2010 Stanley Cup Eastern Conference Finals. They were up 3-1 in the series, but down 1-0 early in the first period after Brian Gionta scored less than a minute into the game.
Kimmo Timonen was in the box. Two minutes for roughing.
Mike Richards laid out Marc-Andre Bergeron and went flying down the ice with Claude Giroux on a shorthanded chance. He set up Braydon “Beak” Coburn, who blasted a shot from between the circles. Jaroslav Halak shut him down.
Bergeron got the rebound and carried it back to Philly’s end and took another hit for his troubles. The puck eventually made its way to the corner, where Giroux lofted it out of the zone. Richards dove to the ice to beat Roman Hamrlik to the puck.
Halak came flying out of the crease, and the three collided. Momentum carried Richards forward, and he got back to his feet and gained control of the puck right in front of the net.
With his back to the net, he paused for a second, took in the enormity of the moment, and finished off the play with a backhanded, shorthanded goal to tie the game at one.
As the cliché goes, the crowd went wild.
Arron Asham and Jeff Carter each scored in the second to put Philly up 3-1. Richards assisted on the Carter goal, and the two paired up again for the final goal of the game and the series.
The Flyers took the series 4-1 with that win. It remains the franchise’s most recent trip to the Finals. Fifteen years later, “The Shift” lives on in our minds and hearts.
You can watch a replay of the game in its entirety here: