Husso's story here is still being written.
I don't know how you could watch game 5 and come to the conclusion that he played poorly. He didn't play as well as Binner was playing before the injury, but he was good. His toe save on the shorthanded 2-1 to keep it a 1-0 game in the 1st was massive. His two stops in the closing seconds of the 1st period were game savers. He made a nice toe stop on a high-to-low deflection AND made a strong lateral push to stop the rebound. The game is over if they make it 3-0 with 15 seconds left in the 1st. He made a fantastic blocker stop on Byrum after a lateral pass saw Byrum walk right down the slot and rip a high shot from the has marks. That would have made it 4-1 with 11 minutes left. Again, that's a game saver.
As for the goals against, I don't get the criticism.
Goal #1 was a deflection off an attempted shot block that caused the puck to go back against the grain as he is moving the other direction to follow Mac's skating. It's a stoppable shot, but it isn't a bad goal. Stop it more often than not, but you're fine if that is the low point of the game. Which it was.
Goal #2 was a hard drive to the net that Husso stopped. But the rebound goes off his D man's chest and directly into the far side of the net. There isn't a remotely reasonable argument to put that on the goalie.
Goal #3 was a high-to-low deflection that also changed the lateral trajectory of the puck to go further far side. That's not getting stopped at any level.
Goal #4 was a goal-of-the-playoffs candidate that was an insane individual effort by Mac. he was giving every indication that he was going to drive the net and push the puck from his backhand to his forehand toward the far side of the net. Instead, he let the puck sit between his feet and then forehanded the puck from inside his skates short side. Husso's only opportunity to be square to the puck and cover the short side would have been an aggressive push to the post that would have left him wildly out of position if Mac cut back to the middle (which looked to be his clear intention). This board would have lost its mind at Husso if he exploded to the short side and then Mac just pushed the puck to his forehand and buried it into an empty net far side. He forced Mac to make an all-world play there and Mac did so. Putting this on the goalie is insane.
He allowed 1 arguably-soft goal and made 3 enormous stops to keep us within striking distance. It wasn't a perfect game, but it was absolutely a good outing. We can win this series with 2 more outings like that. I'm not enormously confident that he will provide that, but lumping game 5 in with his play over his previous 4 starts isn't fair or accurate.
