Florida 2-5 in 1st chance to win series over past 2 seasons
© Eliot J. Schechter/NHLI
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — It is a familiar position for the Florida Panthers, one game to win a series.
Over the past three seasons, over the 10 series in which they have won three games, the Panthers are 4-6 in their first chance to close out an opponent. In the past two seasons, they are 2-5 and, of course, famously took three chances to finish off the Edmonton Oilers in last season’s Stanley Cup Final before winning in Game 7.
They will get yet another opportunity on Tuesday at Amerant Bank Arena (8 p.m. ET; MAX, truTV, TNT, SN, TVAS, CBC), leading the Oilers 3-2 in the best-of-7 Cup Final, after their Game 5 win in Edmonton on Saturday pushed them to the verge of another title.
But will they?
“The experience helps and every series you learn something,” captain Aleksander Barkov said. “Those games, they teach you a lot. Obviously, when the time comes and you have a chance to end the series or stuff like that or you have that big game, obviously, you want it so much that you’re maybe trying to do a little too much, like you’re trying to do something different than what you’ve been (doing).
“So, for us, it’s to stick with what we’ve been doing and that’s the whole key.”
That key is to be themselves, to be the team that turned their game on as soon as the Stanley Cup Playoffs started, the team that has won 10 of 11 series over the past three seasons — and is on the cusp of 11-for-12 — even if they haven’t always done it in as few games as they might.
“When you go through a bunch of playoff series like we have and I have, most of the time [the last game] is the toughest one,” Matthew Tkachuk said. “Edmonton’s one of, if not the best, team that I’ve played in my career in playoffs, so I’m sure it’s going to be a very tough one.
“I think it’s important when you play a team that their backs are against the wall, it’s important to come out with a good start, both sides. I know everybody says that each and every game, but I think if you can get to your game right away, the team that settles in the quickest, that seems to be the one that has a lot of success.”
So far, the Panthers have been able to do that against the Oilers, even if these Oilers have shown a decided knack for fighting back.
Last season, in those elimination games, the nerves were crushing, the first chance most of the Panthers had come to within reach of the Cup, the first time they had seen a lifelong dream become attainable. So, as coach Paul Maurice said, “We were all pretty wired after Game 3 last year, and I think we can handle that a bit better now.”
“I think everything we’ve kind of gone through we just have more experience, so you get a little bit more comfortable in the situation,” forward Evan Rodrigues said. “Whenever you can gain experience and feel like the moment’s not bigger than it is, it helps. It helps the nerves.”
That’s the thought, at least.
It was two rounds ago that Maurice joked, while the team was playing the Toronto Maple Leafs, that they should have learned that lesson better, that they perhaps had forgotten it, at the same time that the Maple Leafs extended to a Game 7 what could have ended in Game 6.
Maybe those lessons have been further cemented now.
“Absolutely you’re always trying to learn what you can do better,” forward Sam Reinhart said. “It seemed like it was a two-week span trying to close out last year. It was a long two weeks. I think we learned a tremendous amount from it — just take it day-by-day and not focus too much on the future. That’s where we’re at now.”
When they tried to close out the Oilers last season and couldn’t, not in Game 4 or Game 5 or Game 6, there were other factors. There were families to deal with and logistics and superstitions, things that had to be discussed, even if no one wanted to discuss them. There was so much outside of the actual game being played on the ice.
Now, they’ve done all that.
“There’s a whole bunch of things we had never experienced before,” Maurice said. “And now, skip right to the hockey game. It’s a different set of emotions for us.”
But what it comes down to, as Maurice said, is that they were able to do it eventually. The Panthers are 0-2 with a chance to close out a series at home this postseason, having been shut out in both games — a 2-0 loss to the Maple Leafs in the Eastern Conference Second Round, and a 3-0 defeat to the Carolina Hurricanes in the conference final.
Even if it wasn’t the first shot, even if it took a little longer, they still closed those teams out.
“There’s 16 good teams, right?” Maurice said. “So, you’ve played well and put yourself in a position to eliminate the other team, but it’s not guaranteed because the other team is pretty darn good. So, there’s nothing learned where we say, ‘OK, now we’ve figured it out.’ Because if you figured it out, you’d win the next year, you’d win 16 straight.
“It doesn’t work like that.”
FLA vs. EDM
FLA vs. CAR | EDM vs. DAL
FLA vs. TOR | CAR vs. WSH | DAL vs. WPG | EDM vs. VGK
OTT vs. TOR | FLA vs. TBL | MTL vs. WSH | NJD vs. CAR
STL vs. WPG | COL vs. DAL | MIN vs. VGK | EDM vs. LAK
