1. Flat Out
Maybe it’s an empty-calorie post-game platitude, but Nicklas Backstrom pretty perfectly summed up what we all saw on Friday night:
Nicklas Backstrom on the mindset headed into Game 5: “We have to want it ... we’ve got to be mentally ready and we’ve got to play for each other. That’s maybe something we didn’t do tonight.”
— Samantha Pell (@SamanthaJPell) May 22, 2021
Granted, you’re not going to get a player saying, “They’re just better than us.” But it sure did look like the Caps weren’t ready to play Game 4 and didn’t show much life until the game was all but decided.