Red Wings Dust Off Flyers, 2-1

By HELENE ELLIOTT

June 8, 1997 12 AM PT

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

DETROIT — There were not enough brooms in Detroit to sweep away memories of the Red Wings’ 42 years of futility, of the lean years when they struggled for credibility or--more recently--when they reached the brink of success but lacked the character to take that final step.

Although those memories can never be banished, they were pushed into the dark recesses of NHL history Saturday in the city that calls itself Hockeytown when the Red Wings finished a stunning romp through the Stanley Cup finals with a 2-1 victory over the Philadelphia Flyers, who showed too little valor and too late.

“I think we all had in the back of our mind two years ago, and how devastating it was [to be swept by] New Jersey and we’re just glad we had a chance to prove we could do it,” said goaltender Mike Vernon, awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy as the most valuable player in the playoffs for his 16-4 record and 1.76 goals-against average, the lowest among the 11 goalies who have won the award.

“We’re all Conn Smythe winners in my mind,” he said. “The team in front of me played a great brand of hockey at both ends of the ice. . . . There have been a lot of highs and a lot of lows, but this is the ultimate right here.”

Said center Sergei Fedorov: “This is as sweet as can be.”

It was sweet for the 19,893 fans crammed into Joe Louis Arena. After so much frustration, they went into a frenzy when favorite son Steve Yzerman--who took a few practice hoists with an imaginary trophy--grasped the Cup and skated around the confetti-littered ice so everyone could see its shining glory. Yzerman offered it to owner Mike Ilitch and then lovingly passed it to Russian stars Viacheslav Fetisov and Igor Larionov, who shared the weight of a trophy for which they competed as hard as anyone born on the Canadian prairie.

“I have no liquid inside me to get any tears out,” said Fetisov, 39, and a first-time Cup champion. “There were so many questions if Russian players can win the Cup, and finally we did it. Nobody is going to ask any more questions.”

The Red Wings answered every question posed to them by the Flyers in this series, as they did in previous rounds against the St. Louis Blues, Mighty Ducks and defending Cup champion Colorado Avalanche.

They held opponents to two or fewer goals in 17 of 20 games, a remarkable achievement. They got balanced scoring, superb team defense and the grit they lacked two years ago, when they fell into New Jersey’s neutral-zone trap and couldn’t escape. They limited the high-scoring Flyers to six goals in the series, four of them on power plays and another with 15 seconds left Saturday and goalie Ron Hextall replaced by an extra attacker. Philadelphia led for only two minutes in the series, those in the first period of Game 3.

“Detroit played great. I’m not going to take anything away from the Detroit Red Wings,” Flyer Coach Terry Murray said. “They were poised and they were on a mission. Every one of them played with intensity. . . . They deserved to win. They played better.”

But if the Red Wings deserved to win, the Flyers deserve to be doubted. Their goaltending wasn’t championship caliber and Murray’s frequent switches couldn’t have helped either Hextall or Garth Snow. But worst of all, center Eric Lindros, expected to carry on the legacy of greatness bequeathed to him by Mario Lemieux and Mark Messier, was held in check throughout the series and his Legion of Doom line was neutralized with shocking ease.

“I expected more from myself,” Lindros said. “I didn’t think [this] could happen to our hockey club. I didn’t think we would be beaten four games in a seven-game series, let alone four straight.”

But that’s what happened, by identical 4-2 scores in Games 1 and 2 at Philadelphia and a 6-1 rout Thursday in Detroit before the Flyers mustered a respectable effort Saturday.

They pressured the Red Wings in the first period and were visibly deflated when defenseman Nicklas Lidstrom scored with 33 seconds left. Winger Kirk Maltby, outstanding throughout the playoffs offensively and defensively, set it up with a pass back to the blue line to Lidstrom, who was a stride inside the blue line when he unleashed a low, hard shot that darted between Ron Hextall’s legs as the goalie dropped to the ice.

After surviving some tense moments, the Red Wings applied the crusher at 13:02 of the second period after winger Darren McCarty turned Flyer rookie defenseman Janne Niinimaa inside-out to score a spectacular goal. McCarty took a pass from Tomas Sandstrom, faked a move inside and shifted to the outside, drawing Hextall down before slipping the puck past him for his third playoff goal.

“I bet you thought I was Stevie or Sergei, right?” McCarty said, grinning.

The Flyers finally broke through on Lindros’ first goal of the finals, but it came far too late to do anything but give them a shred of consolation to take into what will be a long, unhappy summer.

“We were confident coming in, but we didn’t play our best hockey,” winger Shjon Podein said. “You’ve got to give them a lot of credit.”

For the Red Wings, everything came together. Even Gordie Howe, whose relationship with the club has been strained, was in the locker room to congratulate players afterward.

“It was beautiful,” said Howe, a member of the Red Wings’ last Cup-winning team in 1955. “It’s been too long.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Finals Sweeps

Stanley Cup winners that have swept the final series since the inception of the best-of-seven format in 1939:

* 1940-41 -- Boston Bruins def. Detroit Red Wings

* 1942-43 -- Detroit Red Wings def. Boston Bruins

* 1943-44 -- Montreal Canadiens def. Chicago Blackhawks

* 1947-48 -- Toronto Maple Leafs def. Detroit Red Wings

* 1948-49 -- Toronto Maple Leafs def. Detroit Red Wings

* 1951-52 -- Detroit Red Wings def. Montreal Canadiens

* 1959-60 -- Montreal Canadiens def. Toronto Maple Leafs

* 1967-68 -- Montreal Canadiens def. St. Louis Blues