There has been just one Game 7 in the finals since 2011, back in 2019Andy Devlin/NHLI via Getty Images
Monday night's Stanley Cup Final Game 7 between the Oilers and Panthers “shapes up as one of the biggest contests in recent NHL history,” with a number of storylines set to play out, according to Mark Madden of TRIBLIVE. There has been just one Game 7 in the finals since 2011, back in 2019. Madden wrote this Game 7 is “mostly about” Oilers C Connor McDavid. If the Oilers get the Cup and McDavid gets the Conn Smythe Trophy, he “enters the discussion about hockey’s greatest of all time.” If the Panthers lose, it is “soul-crushing” for them. Emotionally, their “window will be closed.” They will “carry around that disaster like a disease” and “will be scarred permanently.” It is “marvelous theater and something the NHL badly needs” (
TRIBLIVE, 6/22).
NEEDED BOOST: In N.Y., Ethan Sears wrote Game 6 was not about McDavid, but Game 7 “sure will be.” This is “about writing a legacy, and McDavid has a pen in his hand.” Sears wrote McDavid is “this generation’s greatest player,” with a chance to "lead his team to what would be the greatest feat any team has pulled off in the sport’s modern age.” Sears: “It is hard to comprehend the enormity of what this will mean for McDavid’s place in history, and for the sport as a whole, if the Oilers pull off another victory.” Sears noted U.S. networks have been “reluctant to embrace the Oilers as a national draw.” He added no matter what happens Monday night, if the league “can’t sell McDavid and the Oilers to Americans now -- if networks are still reluctant to haul up to Northern Alberta -- then fire the marketing team.” This series has “produced the best story in sports right now -- the best story the NHL has had in a long, long time” (
N.Y. POST, 6/22).
PRESSURE'S ON: In Ft. Lauderdale, Dave Hyde wrote hockey has not “had a championship night like this in South Florida.” It was not “supposed to have this night, either,” after the Panthers won the first three games. The "nervousness is this Game 7 gift might not be what you want.” It could "haunt the Panthers as long as there’s ice if Edmonton wins a fourth straight game and Connor McDavid carries the cup home." The Panthers either "hold the Cup overhead in a celebration that lasts forever or they have a hangover that stays with them as long as they skate" (
South Florida SUN-SENTINEL, 6/23).
CHOKE CITY? In Miami, Greg Cote wrote the Panthers will either lift the Stanley Cup "for the first time in 30 franchise seasons ... or suffer a loss of epic, historic magnitude.” Cote: “That would see the Cats labeled as the new face of what it means to choke." He added there is "no in-between for what Monday night will bring, the weight of it” (
MIAMI HERALD, 6/22). The GLOBE & MAIL’s Cathal Kelly wrote one week ago, the Panthers “played under cover of relative anonymity.” Now, “for just an instant, they will become an object of fascination for every vaguely sporty citizen of planet Earth.” From Luxembourg to Lahore, people are “going to want to know if those guys who beat each other up on skates really found a way to cough up a 3-0 lead” (
GLOBE & MAIL, 6/22).
