Jordan Binnington continues to break hockey hearts at TD Garden
"I donāt know if people in Boston like me too much."
Hockey fans in Boston were treated to a familiar sight on the TD Garden ice Thursday.
With hockey glory within their grasp, any embers of hope for a Team USA celebration on the frozen sheet were snuffed out with each Grade-A stop made by No. 50 between the pipes.
Jordan Binnington may call St. Louis his home during the winter. But the Blues and Team Canada netminder might be at his best on Causeway Street — especially in a winner-take-all situation.
“I don’t know if people in Boston like me too much,” Binnington noted Thursday night to WEEI.com.
It was a sentiment validated by the gold medal hanging over his neck on Thursday night, with Binnington once again lifting his team to victory in Canada’s 3-2 overtime win over the US in the 4 Nations Face-Off championship game.
The 31-year-old netminder entered Thursday’s showdown against the US as a perceived Achilles’ heel on a stout Canada roster. Through three games of the “best-on-best” tournament, Binnington’s save percentage stood at .892.
While Team USA goalie Connor Hellebuyck is charting a course toward a third Vezina Trophy (.925 save percentage), Binnginton’s regular-season numbers with the Blues (15-19-4, .897 save percentage) don’t exactly leap off the page.
But as evidenced by Game 7 of the 2019 Stanley Cup Final, resumes or stats have meant little to a goalie like Binnington on hockey’s largest stages.
Over 2,000 days after the 25-year-old rookie shuttered the Bruins’ latest shot at hoisting the Stanley Cup with a Game 7 masterclass in Boston (32 saves on 33 shots), Binnington once again did not budge — bailing out Team Canada with several critical stops in overtime before Connor McDavid ended the contest at 8:18 in the extra frame.
Binnington — who finished with 31 saves on 33 shots on Thursday — now sports a .955 save percentage over two championship-clinching performances on Causeway Street.
Brad Marchand has now been on both sides of a clutch Binnington performance — reduced to tears after Boston’s crushing Game 7 loss, and charged with elation after the netminder kept his team in the fight during sudden-death action on Thursday night.
“I mean, you got to give all the credit in the world to Binner,” Marchand said postgame. “In overtime, he made five or six unbelievable saves that just completely changed the course of that game. Tonight, we won the game of inches.”
Before McDavid ended the tournament with a sharp wrister from the slot, Team USA had multiple Grade-A looks of their own earlier in OT.
US captain Auston Matthews — who failed to pick up McDavid in coverage before his game-winner — had arguably the best chance of the night, with Binnington denying his point-blank attempt just 2:51 into overtime.
Minutes later, Binnington again kept Team USA off the board — gloving a blistering shot from Brady Tkachuk while already sprawled out by the left post.
“The feeling after the first [save] he made was ‘Oh, that’s the save we needed. We’re gonna get it.’ And that it happened again and again and again, and eventually it’s like, ‘Man, we gotta pull it together or it’s gonna bite us.’ But he just continued to do it,” Marchand noted.
“And for him to come up that many times in overtime, it speaks a tremendous amount of his character and how prepared he was for this moment, and he took advantage of it. He is the sole reason we win this game tonight.”
TD Garden has been the preferred domain for several infamous antagonists in recent Bruins history, headlined in recent years by Sam Bennett and Matthew Tkachuk.
But on Thursday, Binnington once again validated his standing as one of the premier catalysts of pain among Boston hockey fans.
“He saved his best for last, and that’s what winners do,” Team Canada head coach Jon Cooper said of Binnington.
To comment, please create a screen name in your profile
To comment, please verify your email address
Conversation
This discussion has ended. Please join elsewhere on Boston.com