Connor McDavid had Sergei Bobrovsky at his mercy.
The captain of the Edmonton superstar won a rebound on the side of the net towards the unbalanced goalkeeper of the Florida which was somehow within the framework of the early push on Saturday.
Panthers, as they have so often in the last three sources, have stimulated and have rejected.
Now the Oilers are sitting in a familiar place – faced with the elimination of the Stanley Cup final.
Brad Marchand scored twice to give him six goals in series and Sam Bennett buried his 15th leader in the NHL qualifiers while Florida beat Edmonton 5-2 to take a 3-2 lead in the best seven match.
“Chasing the match again and again against a team like this is very difficult,” said Oilers Ryan Nogent-Hopkins striker, whose group was ahead of 11-4 to five first periods after having lagged 2-0 early on Saturday. “They took advantage of certain opportunities. In the end, we did not do it and it ends up being a difference. ”
Sam Reinhart and Eetu Luostarinen, in the empty net to accompany an assist, had the other goals for reigning champions.
Bobrovsky made 19 stops for the Panthers, which can win a second consecutive cup victory on the Oilers after falling at the Vegas Golden Knights in 2023 when the series returns to Sunrise, Florida, for match 6 on Tuesday.
“It’s an excellent opportunity,” said Bennett. “We are not going to be ahead of ourselves. It will be the most difficult game. We know it. The work has not yet been done. Much more work to do. “
Match 7, if necessary, would be back in Edmonton on Friday.
Bennett and Marchand have been the first players since 1981 with at least five goals each in the same final, and the first teammates to do so since 1973.
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“We just appreciate the moment,” said Marchand. “It’s a special moment, special memories that we will have forever.”
The 37 -year -old is also the first player to record six goals in the final since 1988.
“When you need guys to intensify many times he’s there to produce,” said Reinhart.
McDavid and Corey Perry responded for the Oilers. Calvin Pickard stopped 14 shots.
McDavid and his colleague Star Center Leon Draisaitl were not made available to journalists after the match.
“We have released most of the series now – it’s a state of mind,” said Edmonton Mattias Ekholm defender. “They are a good team for a reason. They went out and showed this at the start of the games and we have to find a way to be better at the start.”
Oilers do not have much time.
“We are a team that can find a way to come back,” said Nugent-Hopkins. “But it’s not going to always happen.”
Edmonton dragged Florida 3-0 in last year’s final to fight with three consecutive victories to force a winner’s final, the club lost 2-1.
McDavid had this precocious chance and another decent look inside an electric Rogers – the noisy and well -lubricated crowd struck 113.4 decibels when the local team hit the ice in front of the washer – before the panthers returned.
Marchand was the fastest on a playing at the center, then exceeded Ekholm before shooting his ninth from the posts of the post and at 9:12 am.
The acquisition of the Boston Bruins trade deadline has now 12 goals in four appearances in the final to become the seventh player in the post-expansion era to reach this number. He has also been the second player since 1967-68 to have at least five goals in the multiple finals after scoring as much in 2011 with the Boston Bruins to join Mario Lemieux (1991 and 1992).
The oilers went to the power game later in the period, but a disjoint and shy sequence resulted in a little time of zone and no blow on Bobrovsky.
Florida doubled its advance a few moments later, when Bennett pulled in front of Pickard, who started before Stuart Skinner after his performance of 23 victories on the bench in the Dramatic of Victory 5-4 of Edmonton in match 4, after the initial shot of Matthew Tkachuk was blocked at 6:06 pm.
Bennett is the fourth active player to have at least 15 goals in a single playoff series, joining Alex Ovechkin and Sidney Crosby and the Oilers striker injured Zach Hyman.
“There is a connectivity that you feel as a group,” said Edmonton Blueliner Darnell Nursee. “We had it for moments during this series, but it was not there tonight.”
Edmonton came back to the advantage of humans in the second period, but Bobrovsky denied Nugent-Hopkins and Perry before McDavid hit the post.
Marchand made 3-0 at 5:12 of the third when he undressed the defender of Edmonton Jack Walman and slipped his 10th Pickard to the house.
McDavid gave the local team a life at 7:24 with a movement of shaking and back on Bobrovsky for its seventh in the playoffs and the first in the final. But Reinhart put things in bed 46 seconds later when he returned home the seventh.
Perry caught a lens of consolation with 3:13 to do in regulation and pickard on the bench for an additional attacker in an Edmonton push who came far too late before Luostarinen did it in the empty net to push the oilers to Pino – and another heartbreaking end.
“We have to win a match,” said the nurse. “That’s all you can control. You don’t look at it otherwise. We have to go to Florida, make our best efforts. ”
“And try to win a match.”
& Copy 2025 the Canadian press