Panthers can’t overcome another early deficit, lose Game 5 of Stanley Cup Final to Oilers
The Florida Panthers’ first chance to win the Stanley Cup came up flat when they got blown out in Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final in Edmonton.
They came closer in their first chance to win it on home ice but suffered the same end result.
The Edmonton Oilers cruised to an early three-goal lead that the Panthers couldn’t erase in a 5-3 loss in Game 5 on Tuesday at Amerant Bank Arena.
The Panthers got within a goal of the Oilers in the opening minutes of the third period on a wrist shot from Oliver Ekman-Larsson, but got no closer.
“You either win or you lose,” said Panthers forward Evan Rodrigues, who had a goal and an assist. “We lost today. We’ll learn from it.”
Florida still leads the best-of-7 series but now has to once again make the cross-continent flight back to Edmonton for Game 6, which is scheduled for 8 p.m. Friday at Rogers Place.
“Every time you’re back in Edmonton it seems to get louder and louder when you didn’t expect it could get any louder. That’s the goal. We’re going to try to drag them back to Alberta,” Oilers forward Connor Brown said pregame. “We love playing on home ice, this is going to be a difficult game and that being said, we feel confident in the type of game it’s going to be, with that anticipation of getting back to Alberta.”
They accomplished that, and Brown set the tone with a first-period shorthanded goal when he intercepted a Brandon Montour pass at the point and went the length of the ice uncontested before beating Sergei Bobrovsky on the breakaway. It was the second consecutive game in which Edmonton opened scoring with a shorthanded goal.
The Oilers pushed their lead to 3-0 five minutes into the second period on a Zach Hyman power-play goal and Connor McDavid wide-angle shot at full strength.
“The last couple games, our start wasn’t good enough,” center Sam Bennett said.
Florida did begin to figure things out in the second half of the game.
Matthew Tkachuk got the Panthers when he took a pass from Rodrigues and fired a wrist shot from the slot to beat Stuart Skinner 6:43 into the period.
Florida and Edmonton then exchanged goals over a 12-second span — first Corey Perry scoring for the Oilers on a power-play goal, then Rodrigues scoring for the Panthers — to put the score at 4-2 Edmonton through two periods.
Ekman-Larsson scored 4:04 into the third period to get Florida within a goal but the comeback bid would come now closer despite a slew of close chances in the third — Florida had a 24-7 edge in shot attempts and 11-4 lead in shots on goal in the third period. The Oilers sealed the game with a McDavid empty-net goal with 18.7 seconds left on the clock.
Now, it’s on to Game 6.
“It’s tough, especially at this stage of where you’re at in the series,” Tkachuk said. “We’ve got another crack at it on Friday. We did a really good job at the beginning of the series of building that lead, so really nothing changes from tonight’s mindset. We’re up 3-2 going back to Edmonton. Couple days to get ready to go for that and get back healthy and rested and ready to go.”
Added Panthers coach Paul Maurice: “It’s hard, but I don’t feel deflated. How do I explain this to you? At the start if every series, we talk about what we want our Game 7 to look like. Nothing’s changed for us. We didn’t get the result that we wanted. We were no good the game before. We were pretty darn good here tonight. That’s how we’re going north.”
This story was originally published June 18, 2024 at 10:54 PM.
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