SUNRISE, Fla. — The Edmonton Oilers won their first Stanley Cup exactly 40 years ago, knocking off the dynasty New York Islanders at the old Northlands Coliseum way back in 1984.
It only felt like four decades for Ryan Nugent-Hopkins to reach this Stanley Cup Final against the Florida Panthers. He was drafted No. 1 overall by the Oilers in 2011, and made the playoffs just once in his first eight seasons.
Now, just 881 regular-season games later, the longest-serving Oilers player will lace ‘em up in a long awaited Final.
“Like most players, you go through some tough times,” he said Saturday morning. “It’s rare for it to all just go well through your entire career. I went through that the start of the career, then had some really good years where we really had a belief in the team.
“This core group has always believed that we’ve had it in us to get to this point. But, obviously, it’s a long road and difficult to do. So, we’re excited to be here.”
Styles make fights
Big picture, the Final is being framed as the greatest offensive club versus the best defensive one. Heck, the Edmonton Oilers will roll out four skaters with more post-season points than Matthew Tkachuk, the Florida Panthers’ leading scorer.
Yes, the Oilers (3.5 goals per game) have been more productive than the Panthers (3.24), and their deadly power play is on another level.
But Edmonton is getting stingier in its own end — dropping its 2.88 regular-season goals allowed down to 2.61 through three rounds — and Florida has created many more Grade-A offensive looks than have appeared on the scoreboard.
The Panthers have just run into three All-Star goalies: Andrei Vasilevskiy, Jeremy Swayman and Igor Shesterkin.
“This is going to be a really interesting, (an) incredibly even series, because there aren’t holes. I don’t see a hole in their game. Their defensive game is good. And we don’t need to talk about their offence anymore. It’s really good. It’s brilliant,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said of Edmonton. “Like, their defensive analytics are almost as good as ours. We’re a way better offensive team than people know as well.
“You have to defend against the whole group. Active back end. Clearly, superstars up front. And then we got some really good players, too. So, it’s both sides of the puck equally weighted. We play an aggressive defensive game when we don’t have the puck, and I think we attack pretty smartly when we do.
“I feel the same way about their game. Their defensive game is far stronger, far more structured than I think I hear when I’m watching the games, or I read about them.”
Just ask the Dallas Stars, who mustered all of four goals in their final three games of the Western final.
Power-play problem
Having the best power play in these playoffs can be as much curse as blessing.
So, we asked head coach Kris Knoblauch: Does his team get fewer calls because the referees know that giving the Oilers a power play will have a greater effect on the game than any other team?
“I’m biased,” Knoblauch said. “I feel like we should have more power plays called, we should be having more man advantages. But I would think there would be 31 other coaches that feel the same way.”
During the regular season, Edmonton ranked 19th in the NHL in power-play opportunities, and had the fourth-best percentage in the league (26.3 per cent).
In the playoffs, Edmonton ranks second with 51 power plays granted, behind only Florida (60). The Oilers’ success rate is tops at 37.3 per cent, while Florida sits sixth at 23.3 per cent.
“In past experiences of coaching teams with really good power plays, I know that officials were reluctant to give power plays because, if they call something, it’s almost like you’re giving them a goal,” Knoblauch said. “But that’s probably a different level, and a different level of officials. I would think it’s different here in the National Hockey League.”
We shall see, as this Final plays out.
How they line up
The Oilers will go with Warren Foegele in their lineup for Game 1, as Knoblauch opens his first ever Stanley Cup Final by changing a lineup that won the last three games of the Western Conference Final.
Foegele likely steps in on the fourth line, after spending the last three games as a healthy scratch, with Ryan McLeod and Corey Perry. Defenceman Philip Broberg will likely move to his off side on a pairing with Brett Kulak.
Here’s how Edmonton will look:
RNH-McDavid-Hyman
Kane-Draisaitl-Holloway
Janmark-Henrique-Brown
Foegele-McLeod-Perry
Ekholm-Bouchard
Nurse-Ceci
Kulak-Broberg
Skinner
Here are the Florida lines and pairings. It’s an identical lineup to the one that dusted off the New York Rangers in Game 6 of the Eastern Conference Final.
Verhaeghe-Barkov-Reinhart
Tkachuk-Bennett-Rodrigues
Luostarinen-Lundell-Tarasenko
Lorentz-Stenlund-Okposo
Forsling-Ekblad
Mikkola-Montour
Ekman-Larsson-Kulikov
Bobrovsky
McDavid vs. Barkov
Florida’s reward of having the better regular season is last change.
And while Maurice is downplaying the matchup game, Connor McDavid should expect a steady diet of Aleksander Barkov, whose line allowed only one goal combined when meeting stars Nikita Kucherov, David Pastrnak and Artemi Panarin 5-on-5.
“Last truly hard match coach was probably Randy Carlyle, and I don’t think you see it as hard as you used to. It was the D matches, but even then, everybody can skate,” Maurice said.
Anton Forsling and Aaron Ekblad will be assigned McDavid on the back end.
“We all have a match, and we have an idea going into the game, and those are good ideas,” the coach said. “We know what Barkov is, and we know what McDavid is. But that puck’s gonna drop, and it’s not always what you think. So, you make your adjustments as you go.”
Sam Reinhart said there’s no aspect of the game his centreman, the reigning Selke champ, doesn’t excel at. But McDavid presents the ultimate test.
“For about five, six years there, (Barkov) was always regarded as the most underrated player. At what point is he not underrated if he keeps winning that award or getting all those votes?” Reinhart said.
“And then as soon as I came here, I fully understood that he’s still underrated — and I think he still is, to this day. That’s how good he is.”
Predictions galore
One of the beautiful things about the circus of the Stanley Cup Final is its international flavour. Reporters from Europe descend upon the series, and interviews pop off in multiple languages.
Swedish journalist Per Borgman annually gathers championship predictions from his deep contact list and publishes it on Aftonbladet.
Nicklas Lidstrom, Peter Forsberg, Daniel Alfredsson, Elias Pettersson, Niklas Lidstrom, the Sedin twins, Gabriel Landeskog, Victor Hedman and Henrik Lundqvist are all backing the Cats.
Henrik Zetterberg is staying loyal to Ken Holland. He’s got the Oilers.
Check out the full list here.