SUNRISE, Fla. — The Edmonton Oilers’ Greatest NHL Story Ever Told turned out to be unfinished work.
Instead, the Florida Panthers are Stanley Cup champions for the first time after defeating the Oilers, 2-1, Monday night in Game 7 at Amerant Bank Arena.
The home team staved off an all-time choke after losing the previous three games in the series after leading 3-0.
Sam Reinhart’s goal late in the second period proved to be the game-winner, and Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 23 of 24 shots after having allowed 12 goals across the three losses.
“I think it was the opposite [of dread],” said Evan Rodrigues, who assisted on the night’s opening goal by Carter Verhaeghe. “I think it was relief. We had the chance to get back to our game and play the defense-first style that we’re used to. The pressure kind of came off of us a little bit. We were just able to play our game and defend and the game just kind of came to us.”
Those waiting for Connor McDavid, a.k.a. the best player in the world, to finally take over and cement the Oilers’ dream will have to wait till next year.
So will those rooting for a first Stanley Cup champion from north of the border since the Canadiens defeated the Kings in 1993.
Edmonton failed to add a sixth title, which would have been the first without either Wayne Gretzky (four) or Mark Messier (one) as captain.
“Sucks. It sucks,” said McDavid, who was named the Conn Smythe Trophy winner as the playoff MVP, his astounding 42 points not impressing a partisan crowd that booed Commissioner Gary Bettman’s announcement.
“We knew it was gonna be tight. Game 7 for the Cup,” McDavid continued. “We knew it was gonna be a real tight game, it was gonna come down to one thing here and there.”
With the game tied at one late in the second period, Panthers defenseman Dmitry Kulikov made a crucial play, clearing the puck off his goal line with Dylan Holloway closing in on it.
The puck went to Verhaeghe, who fed Reinhart down the right side.
Reinhart’s wrist shot beat Stuart Skinner low to the glove side with 4:49 to go in the period to make it 2-1 Panthers, a lead they carried to the Promised Land.
“We’re an inch away from going ahead 2-1 right before they go up 2-1,” McDavid said. “It’s tough. They shut things down. We had our looks, couldn’t find it.”
Things got a little dicey for Bobrovsky with about seven minutes to go when McDavid was loose in the slot with the puck.
The playoff MVP couldn’t get off a clean shot but the goalie ended up having to make a save on Zach Hyman.
With 3:40 on the clock, Bobrovsky sprawled on the ice several times and even lost his stick, but the Oilers could never find the handle.
The Oilers continued to apply the pressure, and the decibel level in the building elevated even more, but the red light behind Bobrovsky stayed unlit.
The puck ended up in a scrum in the right corner as the clock ticked down.
As the horn sounded, the Cats rushed Bobrovsky, and the team’s signature rubber rats pelted the ice.
“Playoffs are a tough thing where you have emotions that go up and down, up and down,” said Aleksander Barkov, the first Finnish captain to lift the Stanley Cup. “Every single win, you feel good about yourself, and when you lose you feel like, ‘OK, that’s not us, we’ve got to play better.’ We just stayed with it and played probably our best game of the series in Game 7.”
The result gave first championships to longtime NHL combatants Kyle Okposo, the former Islander who is in his 17th season, and Paul Maurice, who lifted the Cup for the first time in 26 seasons as a head coach in the league.
The Oilers’ season was already one for the record books before their historic Stanley Cup Final comeback attempt.
Their regular season featured a 16-game winning streak, the second-longest in NHL history.
They were trying to become the fifth NHL team to win a series from an 0-3 deficit, and the first in 82 years in the final.
But the hole they’d dug turned out to be a bit too deep.
“We showed all year long that we could fight back even in the most dire situations,” McDavid said. “Obviously, [it was] tough to be down three [games]. Tough to string four in a row against a good team like that, but we were right there.”
