‘Unshakable’ Oilers keep rolling, force Game 7
EDMONTON, Alberta — Connor McDavid was held without a point, so Leon Draisaitl and the Edmonton Oilers‘ other top players stepped up to put them one win from the Stanley Cup.
Draisaitl made his first major impact in the Final by setting up Warren Foegele‘s early goal, Adam Henrique and Zach Hyman scored in the second period and the Oilers forced a Game 7 by beating the Florida Panthers 5-1 in Game 6 on Friday night.
“At the end of the day, we play to win and this is going to be the hardest game for us,” Draisaitl said. “We have to bring our game again.”
They are the third team to tie the final after falling behind 3-0 in the series, and the first since the Detroit Red Wings in 1945. The Oilers have the chance Monday night in Sunrise, Florida, to join the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs as the only NHL teams to come all the way back from that deficit to hoist the Stanley Cup.
“There was an unshakable belief,” Hyman said. “No matter what happened throughout the year, we always believed we could pull through. No matter how dire the circumstances, we think we have a chance. It was a long season facing adversity which prepared us. The next one will be the hardest. It feels unbelievable to do it in front of this crowd. To have a chance to win now, this is our first opportunity to win.”
After falling into a 3-0 series hole, the Oilers have rallied by scoring five-plus goals in three straight games, the longest streak in a Stanley Cup Final since the Pittsburgh Penguins did it in 1991, according to ESPN Stats & Information research.
The opportunity to make hockey history and end Canada’s three-decade-long Cup drought exists only after McDavid’s heroics with four points apiece in Games 4 and 5 to take the Oilers from the brink to belief. This was the first time in his nine-year career they’ve won a game in which he did not have a point or put a shot on net.
Draisaitl, his longtime running mate from Germany who has also been league MVP and considered among the best players in the world, lit the spark in Game 5 after being largely ineffective against the Panthers.
“He’s a horse,” defenseman Darnell Nurse said. “He’s always showing up at the biggest moments. You look at all his playoff performances, he’s one of the best to ever do it.”
Draisaitl got the puck at center ice, skated around and through Florida defenders and put the puck on the tape of Foegele’s stick for a tap-in that Sergei Bobrovsky had nearly no chance of stopping. That, of course, did not stop the fired up sellout crowd of 18,000-plus from mockingly chanting, “Ser-gei! Ser-gei!”
The goalie everyone calls “Bob” was hardly to blame, though, with mistakes in front of him also contributing to the 2-on-1 rush that ended with Henrique beating Bobrovsky off a 2-on-1 rush off a perfect pass from Mattias Janmark. The Panthers in front of their goaltender looked tight and timid and unlike the juggernaut that reached the final for a second consecutive year and won the first three games to move to the verge of the first title in franchise history.
“We have one game to go,” Panthers defenseman Dmitry Kulikov said. “We were ready right from the start to play a seven-game series, and nothing changes now. We got up three, and they played three good games. Now it’s up to us to win at home.”
Florida had just six shots on net midway through the game and finished with 21. Continuing a trend of being there when the Oilers need him the most, goaltender Stuart Skinner made timely saves to stymie the Panthers, allowing just a goal to Aleksander Barkov less than 90 seconds into the third period.
“He’s been lights-out when we’ve needed him,” Janmark said of Skinner.
The first time Barkov got the puck past him, 10 seconds after Henrique scored, the goal came off the board when Edmonton coach Kris Knoblauch successfully challenged for offside. A lengthy review found Sam Reinhart entered the offensive zone perhaps an inch or less before the puck, the announcement of which was followed by a roar from fans.
“I actually didn’t think it was that close,” Knoblauch said. “In my mind, it was definitely offside.”
That was not the loudest Rogers Place got, and there were plenty of candidates for that distinction. The decibel meter shown on video screens reached 113.8 when the Oilers stepped on to the ice to the tune of Metallica’s “Enter Sandman.”
It might have approached that noise level when Ryan McLeod and Nurse scored empty-netters in the final minutes, setting off chants of “We want the Cup!” “We want the Cup!” and a wild celebration at the viewing party outside.
That was the fever pitch of a city that was awash in a sea of blue and orange downtown in the hours before puck drop. Friday might as well have been a holiday in Edmonton, the home of nearly a million people now fully able to let themselves dream of the Oilers adding another white championship banner to the rafters — and do so in the most improbable way possible.
“We’re just excited to keep our season going,” McDavid said. “That’s what it’s been about. One game at a time, one day at a time. Looking forward to the next one.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
The San Francisco Giants are acquiring All-Star slugger Rafael Devers from the Boston Red Sox, sources confirmed to ESPN’s Jeff Passan on Sunday evening.
The Giants are sending starter Jordan Hicks and 23-year-old lefty Kyle Harrison, among others, to Boston in exchange, sources said.
Devers, 28, is in just the second season of a 10-year, $313.5 million contract he signed to stay in Boston in January 2023, however his relationship with the team suffered a significant blow after the star third baseman was reportedly blindsided by a move to designated hitter in the spring.
Tensions flared again last month after Devers refused an offer from the team to move him to first base after starting first baseman Triston Casas was ruled out for the season with a knee injury.
It reached a point where Red Sox owner John Henry met with the disgruntled star, making a rare trip to meet the team on the road and smooth things over after Devers’ pointed comments about the request to switch positions again.
Hicks and Harrison give a pitching-starved Red Sox team more depth on their staff while Devers provides a huge boost to a middling Giants offense.
Devers has more than 200 career home runs to his name and has a .894 OPS for Boston this season.
The deal was first reported by Fansided.
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Alden Gonzalez
Shohei Ohtani‘s pitching debut for the Los Angeles Dodgers might be quickly approaching.
Manager Dave Roberts told reporters Sunday that Ohtani would throw another simulated game in the coming days that could “potentially” be his last one, and a source told ESPN’s Buster Olney that Ohtani should join the Dodgers’ rotation “sooner rather than later,” potentially within the week.
Ohtani took a big step forward during his most recent simulated game at Petco Park on Tuesday, throwing 44 pitches over the course of three innings against a couple of lower-level minor league players. Ohtani’s fastball reached the mid- to upper-90s, and he exhibited good command of his off-speed pitches in what amounted to his third time facing hitters. Afterward, Roberts said there was a “north of zero” chance Ohtani could join the rotation before the All-Star break.
Because of his two-way designation, the Dodgers can carry Ohtani as an extra pitcher, which means he can throw two to three innings and have someone pitch after him as a piggyback starter. At this point, it seems that is the Dodgers’ plan.
The Dodgers’ pitching staff has again been plagued by injury, with 14 pitchers on the injured list, including four starting pitchers the team was heavily counting on for 2025 — Blake Snell, Tony Gonsolin, Roki Sasaki and Tyler Glasnow.
If Ohtani returns in July — the likely outcome at this point — he will be 22 months removed from a second repair of his ulnar collateral ligament.
The update isn’t as optimistic for Sasaki. He paused his throwing program and is set for a lengthy layoff. Sasaki has not pitched in a game since May 9 and is not part of the team’s long-term pitching plans this season.
“I think that’s what the mindset should be,” Roberts said. “Being thrust into this environment certainly was a big undertaking for him, and now you layer in the health part and the fact he’s a starting pitcher, knowing what the build-up [required to return] entails … I think that’s the prudent way to go about it.”
Sasaki, 23, went 1-1 with a 4.72 ERA in eight starts after joining the Dodgers from the Pacific League’s Chuba Lotte Marines, averaging less than 4⅓ innings per start. He walked 22 and struck out 24 in 34⅓ innings, and his fastball averaged 95.7 mph, down 3-4 mph from his average in Japan.
Roberts said Sasaki was pain free when he resumed throwing in early June, but the pitcher was shut down after feeling discomfort this past week. Sasaki recently received a cortisone injection in the shoulder; Roberts said no further scans are planned.
“I don’t think it’s pain,” Roberts said. “I don’t know if it’s discomfort, if it’s tightness, if he’s just not feeling strong, whatever the adjective you want to use. That’s more of a question for Roki, as far as the sensation he’s feeling.
“He’s just not feeling like he can ramp it up, and we’re not going to push him to do something he doesn’t feel good about right now.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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