The Philadelphia Flyers have a lot of great offensive talent on paper, with the talented Daniel Briere joined by veterans Mike Knuble and Vaclav Prospal along with third-year forwards Mike Richards and Jeff Carter.
But in their second-round series against the Montreal Canadiens, there was one player who stood out on the stat sheet based on his scoring pace alone.
R.J. Umberger, who was considered a third or fourth-line player at the start of the season, has become Philadelphia's top gun in the playoffs. Case in point: He scored an eyebrow-raising eight goals and nine points in five games against the Habs, and scored the first goal for the Flyers in each victory. While many credit Martin Biron's stellar goaltending for holding off the Montreal offence (and deservedly so), Umberger, a former first-round pick of the Vancouver Canucks, broke the Canadiens early and often.
For a player who scored only 13 times in the regular season and a goal and an assist in seven games against Washington, Umberger reminded disgruntled Montreal fans of another Hab-killer in black and orange named John LeClair. "In my first year I scored 20, so there were times when I was hot," Umberger said last week. "But as a pro, this might be one of the hottest times I've had."
Umberger was one of four prime playoff player who guided their respective teams to the Conference Finals, and TSN.ca looks back at three other second round heroes that emerged during the second round.
Johan Franzen - Detroit Red Wings
Chirs Osgood is 6-0 in goal since taking over for Dominik Hasek in the first round, and you can bet that Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg were top picks in just about everyone's playoff pool.
But were there any takers on Franzen?
The Swedish centre, who netted a club-record nine goals against the Avalanche, has a club-record 11 in one playoff year. That's quite a statement for a team that has had great postseason performers like Gordie Howe, Steve Yzerman, Sergei Fedorov and Brendan Shanahan.
His nine goals against Colorado - including three game-winners - beat Howe's mark of eight in a series set way back in 1949.
"He's been great," said Red Wings coach Mike Babcock. "He's a big, big man with lots of skill. I'm not taking anything away from what we did, but their team was depleted by the end here. He's been big now for a long time. He broke Gordie's record in March, and then he broke his record here today. So good for him. If you're going to break records, you might as well break Gordie Howe's."
Brenden Morrow - Dallas Stars
Of the four captains from the remaining playoff teams, no one has lived up to the 'C' on his chest more than Morrow.
And nowhere was this more evident than in the Stars' quadruple-overtime win against the San Jose Sharks on Sunday. Morrow finished with 19 hits in the game, twice the amount of any other player on the ice. He set the tone with a clean, bone-jarring check on Milan Michalek that ousted him from the game and topped it all off with the game-winning goal - his seventh of the playoffs.
"Tonight was as fitting as anything I've ever seen in sports that Brenden got that winning goal," Stars coach Dave Tippett said of Morrow, who had two goals disallowed in Game 5. "He took his team on his back."
The Stars have won four of their last five playoff overtime games, and Morrow has scored three of them. His scoring prowess already reminds many Dallas fans of Joe Nieuwendyk's clutch performance in 1999 that led the Stars to their first Stanley Cup.
Evgeni Malkin - Pittsburgh Penguins
Last week, the NHL announced that Malkin was one of the three finalists in the voting for the Hart Trophy as most valuable player to his team. And if he keeps scoring the way he does in the postseason, some Conn Smythe Trophy votes will be going his way as well.
The sophomore centre led Pittsburgh with four goals - two of them game-winners - and seven points in five games against the Rangers. His performance in Game 3 - a three-point effort in a 5-3 win - even prompted teammate Marian Hossa to call him, "the best player in the world."
Who was your second round hero? Make Your Call on the message board.