The Carolina Hurricanes' Jackson Blake, left, and Nikolaj Ehlers react after Blake scored the game-winning goal in overtime during Game 4 of a second-round NHL Stanley Cup playoff series against the Flyers on Saturday in Philadelphia. (AP photo)

The Carolina Hurricanes have secured their long-sought shot at breaking through a familiar roadblock in the Eastern Conference final.

Now the Hurricanes — the only undefeated team left in the NHL playoffs — are set for another a lengthy wait to get started in the third round.

Carolina beat the Philadelphia Flyers 3-2 in overtime on Saturday night, becoming the first team to sweep through the first two rounds since the league went to best-of-seven series in all four rounds in 1987. That has them back in the conference final for the third time in four seasons and fourth time in the current eight-year playoff run under coach Rod Brind’Amour.

The Hurricanes will face the Montreal-Buffalo winner, a series running through at least Thursday. The East’s top seed had nearly a full week off after sweeping Ottawa in Round 1.

“I think it’s probably going to be an even longer break this time,” veteran forward Taylor Hall said after Saturday’s win in Philadelphia.

“The big positive is we’re on to the third round relatively unscathed and healthy. You don’t want to see injuries per se, but we hope these series go far and these teams have battles. That’s the advantage we’re going to have. … Rod, our strength staff, all of our staff, do a good job of making sure that we’re ready athletically to play. And from there, we get our footing pretty quickly.”

The Hurricanes have done exactly that since winning the first game of the NHL playoffs on April 18. They already have proven they can start quickly after a long break, opening the Flyers series with a dominating first period on the way to a 3-0 win.

“We had a plan, and clearly it was OK,” Brind’Amour said, “so we can follow that and run with it.”

Time to recharge

Carolina’s game plan relies on grinding effort and energy: an aggressive forecheck to pressure opponents into mistakes, possessing the puck in the offensive zone and staying there and firing chances at goaltenders and chasing rebounds — all of which minimizes scoring chances going the other way.

That’s why the benefit of fresh legs and recharged minds has mattered more than the risk of rust so far.

Consider veteran goaltender Frederik Andersen. The 36-year-old Dane had started 32 playoff games for Carolina the past three years and the question lingered as to how much to lean on Andersen with 31-game winner Brandon Bussi also available.

But Andersen has been the best goaltender of the playoffs so far, with a 1.12 goals-against average and a .950 save percentage. He has two shutouts and has faced 25 or fewer shots in five of his eight games. Now he’ll get another break to stay fresh.

As Andersen put it: “You don’t really want to add extra games if you can avoid it.”

Or there’s the case of defenseman Sean Walker.

It was in the hours after Thursday’s Game 3 road win that he got the call from wife Taylor back in North Carolina that their first baby was on the way. So, he hopped an early morning flight home for the arrival of a daughter just in time for Mother’s Day. He ate his pregame meal in the hospital cafeteria, then flew to Philadelphia around 2 p.m. Saturday ahead of the 6:15 p.m. puck drop.

“I didn’t want to get on the boys and tell them we better win tonight, but I’m really appreciative that everybody dug in,” Walker said. “The sweep’s huge for everybody. But to take this time to just be with my family is going to be really special.”

___

AP NHL playoffs: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://apnews.com/hub/nhl