The Edmonton Oilers have been the comeback kids of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
They need their biggest comeback yet.
Trailing 3-2 to the Florida Panthers in the best-of-seven Stanley Cup Final heading into Tuesday’s Game 6 in Sunrise, Florida, the Oilers have a huge hill to climb to keep their championship hopes alive.
“For whatever reason, our group doesn’t like to make it easy on ourselves, and we’ve put ourselves in another difficult spot,” captain Connor McDavid said Monday in anticipation of his team’s do-or-die showdown. “It’s our job to work our way out of it.”
Sure, the Oilers only need one victory — and maybe one lucky break — to even the series and push it to a seventh and deciding game on their home ice, but that is a tall order based on what we’ve seen so far.
Edmonton’s two victories required massive comeback performances, a running theme for this club.
The Panthers have had the upper hand for the rest of the series. Florida has outscored Edmonton by a 23-16 margin, including an 11-4 edge in the first period.
Through five games, the Oilers have held a lead for less than 34 minutes. The Panthers have led for more than 200 minutes.
And through those five games, too many passengers have been donning Edmonton’s silks.
While Leon Draisaitl and Corey Perry have provided plenty for the Oilers, the list of big-time contributors essentially ends there. McDavid may have seven points, but his lone goal was a meaningless third-period marker in Saturday’s 5-2 loss. However, he is far from the guiltiest party.
The much-needed forward depth has been atrocious. Evander Kane has just one goal compared to 20 penalty minutes. Trent Frederic, a key trade-deadline acquisition, has also been more visible taking foolish penalties than providing production. Meanwhile, Adam Henrique, Connor Brown, Viktor Arvidsson and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins — who was so good last round and obviously has been impacted by injury — have been bit parts.
As for Edmonton’s defense corps, which was supposed to be improved from the team that lost last year’s final series to Florida, it has been horrific of late.
It is hard to decide who has been the biggest liability the last few games: offensive standout but defensive nightmare Evan Bouchard; the usually steady Mattias Ekholm; the physical but all-too-often guilty of poor decisions Darnell Nurse; or Jake Walman, who will be etched in history for being treated like a turnstile by Brad Marchand in the last outing.
Even the goaltending provided by Stuart Skinner and Calvin Pickard has been nowhere near good enough.
Much has been made of how McDavid’s quest for a first Cup has followed a similar path to that of Sidney Crosby’s first title — from the fact Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins lost to the Detroit Red Wings in 2008 and then beat the Red Wings in 2009, somehow erasing a 3-2 series deficit en route to the crown.
But Crosby’s team won because of its depth and ability to keep the Red Wings in check. The Oilers have shown no signs they can follow that recipe against a Panthers team that has been fantastic in all areas of the game.
The Stanley Cup Final unquestionably features the two best teams from the first three rounds of the playoffs. To date in this showdown, the Oilers have unquestionably been second best. Changing the course now will require their most impressive rope-a-dope performance of the year.
