No doubt about it, there’s controversy from Game 5 after the St. Louis Blues beat the Boston Bruins 2-1, taking a 3-2 series lead in the 2019 Stanley Cup Final.
[NBC 2019 STANLEY CUP PLAYOFF HUB]
Jordan Binnington was brilliant during Game 5, helping the Blues take a 1-0 lead into the third period, even though Boston carried several stretches of play. Most importantly, Binnington helped St. Louis survive what was quite an onslaught from the Bruins during the first period.
Ryan O’Reilly scored the opening goal, and he also made an alert play to set up the 2-0 tally to David Perron, but it was the controversial moment before that 2-0 goal that will linger for many, particularly Bruins fans. As you can see more about in this post, Tyler Bozak sure seemed to get away with a penalty against Noel Acciari before the goal was scored.
Here’s video footage of that pivotal, polarizing goal:
To make the moment even more glaring, that goal ended up being the game-winner, as Jake DeBrusk scored to shrink St. Louis’ lead to 2-1. Boston made furious pushes to tie things up, but couldn’t manage, as Binnington and the Blues held on.
While Bruins fans were angry enough to throw trash on the ice after that 2-0 goal, and surely felt angry leaving their building, Blues fans were singing “Gloria” while watching along at the Enterprise Center.
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Game 6 of the 2019 Stanley Cup Final airs at 8 p.m. ET on Sunday (NBC; stream here).
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James O’Brien is a writer for Pro Hockey Talk on NBC Sports. Drop him a line at phtblog@nbcsports.com or follow him on Twitter @cyclelikesedins.