FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Now it’s very simple for the Florida Panthers: Win Monday and they’ll be Stanley Cup champions. If you lose on Monday, you will be the first team since World War II to blow a 3-0 lead in the hockey title series.
Either way, the result will last forever.
“It’s probably the most important NHL game in many years,” Panthers forward Matthew Tkachuk said.
He’s not wrong, and for the Panthers, game number 2,464 in franchise history is easily the greatest ever. It is for all the marbles, immortality awaits with a victory, ignominy awaits with a defeat. The Panthers’ fourth and final chance this season to win the Stanley Cup has arrived, with Florida hosting the Edmonton Oilers in this season’s finale on Monday night.
Florida won the first three games. Edmonton won the next three. Not since 1945 has a Stanley Cup Final followed such a trajectory, and not since 1942 has a team trailed 3-0 in the title series and gone on to win, the fate Florida is trying to avoid.
“It doesn’t matter how it turned out, it doesn’t matter how you design it,” Tkachuk said. “They lost the first three games. We lost the next three. It is even now. It doesn’t matter what you went through to get to this point. … This entire season comes down to one game. At home. How can you not be so excited about this? “This is absolutely incredible, an incredible opportunity.”
The first three games, all from Florida. The Panthers outscored the Oilers 11-4, had more hits and more blocked shots, and seemed completely on track.
The last three games, all in Edmonton. The Oilers outscored the Panthers 18-5, are scoring on 22.5% of their shots on goal (a video game rate) and have nearly twice as many blocked shots in that span as Florida.
Add it all up, it’s 3-3. The seventh game is here.
“You can see every story, you can analyze everything, you can say how we agreed, they took the momentum, we were hot on their heels. It doesn’t matter,” Panthers forward Kyle Okposo said. “It’s your next game. You’re only as good as your next game.”
Never mind the roller coaster the teams had to take to get here. It’s just the 18th and seventh game in Stanley Cup Final history. Home teams have won 12 of the previous 17 (a good sign for the Panthers), but road teams have won each of the last three (a good sign for the Oilers).
Panthers coach Paul Maurice was asked if Game 7 will define legacies, including his own, given the historical significance of potentially blowing a 3-0 series lead.
“I’ll let you know at the end,” Maurice said.
Maurice has spent this series listening to questions about winning the Cup (something people try not to talk about until they’ve actually won it), 3-0 leads, the pressure that comes when clinching opportunities are wasted like they were in Game 4, Game 5 and Game 6, and much more along those lines. He’s a smart guy. He understands why those questions arise.
But when he approached the players for a quick chat during Sunday’s practice, it wasn’t about general ramifications. It was taking the temperature of a team he still fully believes in, especially heading into Game 7.
“There’s a much bigger contextual story that means nothing to me now, but means everything to you,” Maurice said. “Those are the stories you have to write. Actually, what makes all of this amazing is the context. No one has ever played in a backcourt in Canada and scored the winning goal in the third game of overtime in the qualifying round. It is a game, always, that excites you. And that is the context of this game and we will live in that context.”
Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov (either he or Oilers captain Connor McDavid accepts the Stanley Cup from NHL commissioner Gary Bettman on Monday night) agrees.
In fact, this is all. Championship or collapse. On Monday night, Panthers history will be written.
“I was probably one of those kids who played alone every time I was outdoors or at home… thinking, ‘This is the seventh game of the Stanley Cup playoffs, maybe even overtime,’” Barkov said “You think about those moments. I have had many such memories, but now they will become reality tomorrow for sure. Exciting. “The most exciting time to be a hockey player.”