Who Can Take the Series Lead in the Stanley Cup Finals?
On June 14th, Game Five of the Stanley Cup Finals will take place in Edmonton’s Rogers Place, where the Florida Panthers will take on the Edmonton Oilers in the same series as 2024. This series has certainly been one to remember, a key example of this being the number of games that have gone to overtime. A whopping three of four games played so far in the Stanley Cup Finals have gone to overtime. Game One went to a single overtime period. Edmonton won that game 4-3. Game Two needed two overtime periods to determine a winner. Florida would win that game 5-4. While Game Three was decided in regulation, Game Four needed an overtime period to determine the winner. Edmonton won that game 5-4. As the Stanley Cup Finals are tied, with both Florida and Edmonton having two wins apiece, the winner of Game Five tomorrow night will take the lead in the Stanley Cup Finals. To see who will win Game Five, analyzing the previous games is necessary.
Games One and Two were both in Edmonton, with Edmonton and Florida winning one game each. Standout Panthers from Games One and Two include Sam Bennett, Nate Schmidt, Carter Verhaeghe, Brad Marchand, Evan Rodrigues, Seth Jones, and Anton Lundell. Over the first two games, Bennett had three goals. Schmidt recorded four assists. Verhaeghe put up three assists, while Marchand scored three goals. Rodrigues had two assists, Jones scored and assisted on a goal, while Lundell had two assists. Standout Oilers from Games One and Two include Leon Draisaitl, Connor McDavid, Evan Bouchard, Viktor Arvidsson, and Corey Perry. Draisaitl had three goals and an assist over the first two games. McDavid recorded five assists in Games One and Two. Bouchard put up a goal and three assists, Arvidsson had a goal and an assist, while Perry also scored a goal and dished out an assist.
Games Three and Four were both in Florida, with Edmonton and Florida winning one game each. While Games One, Two, and Four were all overtime games with a one-goal difference, Game Three was a blowout win for Florida. Florida won 6-1 against Edmonton in Game Three. Standout Panthers from Games Three and Four include Eetu Luostarinen, Sam Reinhart, Carter Verhaeghe, Matthew Tkachuk, Aleksander Barkov, and Bennett once again. Luostarinen had two assists in Game Three. Reinhart recorded two goals and three assists in Games Three and Four. Verhaeghe scored a goal with two assists. For Tkachuk, he had two goals and two assists. Barkov put up two assists and Bennett had a goal and an assist. Standout Oilers from Games Three and Four include Mattias Ekholm, Leon Draisaitl, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Darnell Nurse, and Vasily Podkolzin. Ekholm had three assists in those two games. Draisaitl recorded a goal and two assists. Nugent-Hopkins, Nurse, and Podkolzin each scored a goal and had an assist in Game Four. There has been less consistency in performances in Games Three and Four than in Games One and Two, so standout players noted here either have outstanding on-ice results in either Game Three or Game Four, or have shown consistently great on-ice results in both Game Three and Game Four.
If previous games are an indicator, expect players like Florida’s Bennett and Edmonton’s Draisaitl to continue performing well. One can also expect standout performances from a wide array of talented players on either team. What will also be expected, however, is complete chaos. This chaos has helped bring this series plenty of headlines and news stories, including the controversial cameo of Taylor Swift with Travis Kelce, and including Leon Draisaitl doing something the NHL hasn’t seen in 106 years. With their 5-4 overtime win in Game Four, Edmonton became the first road team in Stanley Cup Final history to rally from a deficit of at least three goals and win since the Montreal Canadiens rallied to defeat the Seattle Metropolitans in overtime in 1919. Whether it be the chaos of an overtime game with such high stakes at the Stanley Cup Finals, or a complete and total blowout on the biggest stage in all of hockey, this series has not been the typical Stanley Cup Finals.
