Jagr's playoff legacy

[Skk82]

Jagr's play against the Devils in the first rd of 98-99 playoffs where NJ was the No.1 and we were No. 8 will remain in my mind his best performance.

Yes, nailed it.

Keep in mind, this is when the Devils were the Devils: Brodeur in full-prime, Stevens/Niedermayer and the host of hard-working forwards (Arnott, Brylin, Holik, Rolston, Pandolfo, etc) and some skill in Elias/Sykora….Not to mention pre-lockout rules and strategies run to a T. New Jersey would win the Cup the following year (2000) and go to game 7 of the Cup finals in '01. They were a very dominant and good team, and were the #1 seed in the East for the 1998-99 playoffs.

After a bad groin injury, Jagr ended up missing games 2-5 of the series, which NJ was winning 3 games to 2.

Game 6: the Pens win 3-2 in OT. Jagr had 2 goals -- including OT winner --, 0 assist (and I think he got jobbed out of the assist on the other goal, scored by his linemate Marty Straka). Pens force a game 7 in Jersey against the #1 seed.

Game 7: Pens win 4-2, Jagr 2 assists and was a +3 on the night.

Granted, the Pens went 2-2 without JJ so it wasn't like he did it all by himself, but the way he hulked up and played so dominantly -- against arguably the best team of that mini-era of the pre-lockout trap -- it was incredible. I've never been more inspired or see a single player put an entire team on his back to defeat a clearly superior opponent.

That's what I think of when I first think of Jagr's playoff legacy.

 

[Hardyvan123]

What happened to him in the 2001 playoffs? Just two goals in 16 games.

Lemiuex only had 17 points in 18 games, the Pens had a relatively weak team and 5 of those games were against the Devils. It was also a low scoring year for playoff players in the east and overall.