Tears were starting to well in his eyes as Ivan Provorov stood in the Flyers locker room following his first playoff series.
The emotion from the usually stoic defenseman had nothing to do with the pain of an unspecified left shoulder injury. It had everything to do with his team having just been eliminated.
“The third period didn’t go as well as I wanted to,” said Provorov, his voice quivering. “I turned the puck over a couple of times and they turned into goals and it’s one of the reasons we lost the game.”
Provorov injured himself late in Friday’s game at Pittsburgh after crashing hard into the boards after tripping over Penguins defenseman Brian Dumoulin.