WASHINGTON, D.C. – Matthew Phillips just had the night dreams are made of.
Facing the team that drafted and developed him, yet failed to give him the ultimate chance, he stole the show, and the win.
In just his fifth NHL game, the 25-year-old Calgarian got his team back into the game with his first NHL goal, added an assist on the tying goal and punctuated his team’s 3-2 shootout win over the Flames with a stirring curtain call as the game’s first star.
It’s the type of moment that makes sports so great.
The classy Calgarian made it clear a day earlier his fifth NHL game wasn’t about revenge or vindication.
The only one he was trying to prove anything to was himself.
And yet, after doing so in such dramatic fashion, with his father in the stands, his first instinct while surrounded by a horde of media types was to pay tribute to someone else.
“First and foremost, I’d just like to send my thoughts to the Snow family back in Calgary,” said Phillips, voice cracking ever so slightly when talking about his former assistant GM in Calgary, who passed away due to ALS on Sept. 30.
“It’s a difficult thing, but they’re making the most of it.”
Class act.
Making the most of it is exactly what he’s always done with a frame generally listed at 5-foot-8, 155 pounds.
It’s also what he’s done with the opportunity the Capitals have afforded the free-agent signing since he arrived in camp last month.
“He’s been great the last month-and-a-half since he’s been here and played his way onto this team,” said Washington coach Spencer Carbery.
“Was great in the preseason and was great in practice.
“Even though you could argue the deck was stacked against him, he fought his way onto this team and just continued after every practice and every game… he wasn’t going to be denied.
“Seeing this first in Boston (when he scored the game-winner) was a great moment for him in overtime in the pre-season.
“But tonight to see the smile on his face coming back in to play his former team, and score his first NHL goal, then makes a great play on his assist… Essentially he’s our offence tonight.”
Converting a brilliant cross from linemate Sonny Milano early in the second period of a game the Caps were being walked all over, Phillips used his soft hands to chip the puck over Jacob Markstrom while driving to the net with a defender all over him.
As the crowd at Capital One Arena roared at his team’s first sign of life, Phillips doubled clutched on a few roars of his own, realizing a dream he’s chased through the minors for five years.
“Feels pretty good, I’ll leave it at that,” he said, without malice, when asked how it felt to do it against the team that dressed him just twice last year despite a lengthy call-up as an AHL scoring leader.
“It was great.
“It’s a pretty cool moment, and something that I’ve done in my head about a million times. So to actually do it feels unreal.
“I’m very lucky to play with some awesome players, and with the pass Sonny made, all I just kind of had to do was bury it.”
How fitting the scratch golfer did it with what he described as a, “60 degree (wedge).”
It was Phillips who might have had an inkling his time was coming this summer when, in his very first golf competition ever, he shot a career-low on the second day of Priddis’ club championship.
Unsure how’d fare against a club full of studs, the humble, ever-smiling Phillips entered the B flight, only to shoot a 66 and card a three-day score better than anyone in the A flight.
“So, I’m like the biggest sandbagger ever,” he chuckled.
A sixth-round pick who did everything he was asked in his seven years in the organization, Phillips’ is the ultimate underdog story, as Carbery alluded to.
Yet, there he was on one power play, toiling opposite a man who will soon be dubbed the greatest goal scorer of all time.
On this night, no. 45 was better than the Great 8.
Dreams can come true.
After his club was outshot by the Flames 18-3 in the first period, it would have been hard to fathom anyone on the home side would emerge a hero.
His age-old pal and teammate from age 10, Dillon Dube had put the visitors up 2-0 after one, which only served to set the table for Phillips to introduce himself to his new city, on a club he chose to sign with for a fresh chance at his NHL dream.
Did he have a feeling it would be against his former team that he would score the goal every kid dreams of?
“I like to picture myself scoring every night — I guess it just happened tonight,” laughed Phillips, whose night was capped by an Evgeny Kuznetsov shootout winner measured by a sundial.
“It was a pretty unbelievable pass. I just kept saying, ‘please come to me.’”
It meant plenty more his father Doug was on hand to see the goal, as it was to know his 87-year-old grandfather Don Winsor was watching live from Happy Adventure, N.L.
“It’s pretty awesome — it’s a long way from home here and anytime he or any family member can watch, it‘s pretty special,” he said of his father’s trek from Calgary.
“I’m sure he’s going to remember it for sure.”
“It’s something I’ll have to reflect on tomorrow and tonight a little bit.
“I don’t have many words.
“It’s just a pretty awesome feeling.”
