EDMONTON, Alberta — Corey Perry is the only Oilers player with a Stanley Cup ring, winning with the Anaheim Ducks in 2007. As his team faces elimination in Game 4 against the Florida Panthers on Saturday night, Perry's message to his teammates is clear: Play like it's the last time you'll be in the Stanley Cup Final.
“How do you know there will be another time? That's the most important thing you can keep in mind: There may not be another time. I bet half of these guys will never play in the Stanley Cup Final again. It's just the reality of sports,” Perry said Friday. “And that's where you put that fight. That's what you have to come home today and think about.”
The Oilers lost game three of the finals, 4-3, on Thursday. A series of errors in the second period allowed Florida to take a 4-1 lead in front of a stunned crowd in Edmonton. The Oilers rallied with two third-period goals, but forward Leon Draisaitl said, “When you're chasing the game for a lot of the night, it's hard to come back.”
Perry acknowledged that morale was low after the loss, which left Edmonton down 0-3 in the series.
“Last night was tough. It was pretty gloomy here after the game. It's not easy when you go down 3-0 and you play a pretty good game, you make some mistakes and they end up in the back of the net,” he said. saying. “Those things happen in sports. You have to overcome them.”
The hours leading up to Game 4 won't be a reimagining of the Oilers game. While its top five scorers have yet to score a goal in the series, including stars Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, Edmonton has created chances against a Florida defense that ranked first in the regular season. Panthers coach Paul Maurice said the series could have easily been 3-0 in favor of Edmonton with how close the games have been played, with goalie Sergei Bobrovsky frequently being the difference for Florida.
“I feel like after three games, have we deserved to win a game? I think so. I think we've played at least two pretty good games,” Oilers defenseman Mattias Ekholm said. “It hasn't happened to us, but it's four games. We had stretches of eight games and 16 games throughout the regular season. We won three in a row against Dallas. So we can do it. It's a matter of just finding that first. Win and go from there.”
If there's one prevailing mantra in the Oilers locker room, it's that they've put together long winning streaks throughout the season. Goalkeeper Stuart Skinner said after Game 3 that “if anyone can do it, it's the Oil,” and his teammates echoed that.
“Well, this team won 16 games in a row during a regular season. And yeah, not all of them are against Florida, but if you look at the way we played,” Perry said. “The moments in which we have played. We can play with that. We know it. We have shown it. It is a question of will and desire.”
Forward Zach Hyman, who also has no points in this series, agreed that the odds are against Edmonton winning the Cup, but that they have defied the odds this season.
“The odds said we weren't going to make the playoffs on American Thanksgiving and a lot of times in these playoffs we were down too,” he said. “I think we play better when we're up against the wall and facing elimination.”
That's where the Oilers find themselves after three games, knowing that 20 of the 28 teams that took a 3-0 lead in the Stanley Cup Final ended that series in a sweep, and that only one team, the Toronto Maple 1942 Leafs ever rallied to win after digging an 0-3 hole.
