SUNRISE, Fla. — The Edmonton Oilers were blown out by the Florida Panthers 6-1 in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final. They took 21 penalties for 85 penalty minutes, pulled their starting goaltender, had a near line-brawl in the third period, and one of their players was irritated enough to squirt a stream from his water bottle at the Florida bench.

But despite all of this, the Oilers swore that the Panthers, considered to be the NHL’s most agitating team, didn’t get under their skin or in their heads Monday night, as Florida took a 2-1 series lead.

“No, I don’t think so. I think the game obviously got out of hand at the end there. That stuff is going to happen. You look at some of the calls and whatnot, [and] obviously some of them are frustrating,” said winger Evander Kane, who had more penalty minutes in Game 3 (16) than he had in his previous 17 playoff games combined (14).

Kane said when the Oilers tried to match the Panthers’ physicality and instigation, they were penalized, while Florida was not.

“They seem to get away with it more than we do. It’s tough to find the line. They’re doing just as much stuff as we are,” Kane said. “There seems to be a little bit more attention on our group.”

The Panthers had 14 penalties for 55 penalty minutes in the game.

After two tightly played games that left the series tied 1-1 — both of which needed overtime to be settled — Game 3 was a blowout that played right into the Panthers’ hands.

“Right away, I thought we ended up playing what Florida kind of wanted: just a little bit of a track meet, a little bit of grinding, lots of penalties. It was just penalty chaos tonight,” said Oilers goalie Stuart Skinner, who had his weakest game in weeks — including a puck over the glass delay of game penalty that resulted in Florida’s fifth goal and saw Skinner pulled at 3:27 of the third period.

The Panthers excel at agitation. For the first time in the series, Edmonton took the bait.

Kane took two penalties within 2:41 of the first period and later slashed Florida’s Carter Verhaeghe while Verhaeghe was on his stomach in the third period.

Corey Perry taunted the Panthers as “turtles” and got into a shouting match with fourth-liner Jonah Gadjovich while leaving the ice after the second period. Oilers defenseman Jake Walman had his glove stolen by A.J. Greer, a Panthers fourth-liner who deposited the glove into the bench. Walman responded by taking his water bottle and spraying a stream at Florida’s players while standing at his own bench.

“Yeah, I mean I obviously did that for a reason. I won’t go into the details. It’s just gamesmanship, I guess,” Walman said. “I’ve just got to realize there’s cameras everywhere and they see that stuff.”

With 9:31 left in regulation, Oilers center Trent Frederic went after Florida’s Sam Bennett with a cross-check that broke his own stick. He then grabbed the back of Bennett’s jersey to drag him down. A near line-brawl ensued, with Bennett landing punches on Frederic while he was on the ice being held by a linesman.

“He’s been an animal this whole playoffs,” said Panthers winger Brad Marchand of Bennett. “He’s built for this time of year. Just how competitive he is, how intense, and obviously the physicality piece.”

Marchand, after ending Game 2 in double-overtime with a breakaway goal, started the scoring in the first period, just 56 seconds into the game. He deposited a shot high into the net while Skinner wildly lunged at a puck that was no longer there.

The rest of the first period was a parade of penalties — four for both teams — that didn’t result in anything on the scoreboard until Verhaeghe ripped a shot over Skinner’s right shoulder for a power-play goal and 2-0 lead at 17:45. Edmonton’s Viktor Arvidsson was in the penalty box after goalie Sergei Bobrovsky drew a goalie interference penalty.

“We’ve got to be more disciplined than that. We know better than that. I mean eventually, they’re going to find a way. That’s a great team. We shoot ourselves in the foot a little bit there. It kind of takes the flow out of it, you know?” said Walman.

Perry cut the deficit with a power-play goal 1:40 into the second period, but Sam Reinhart scored his first of the series to reestablish the two-goal lead 1:20 later. As they have done all postseason, the Panthers quickly padded their lead with another goal: Bennett’s 14th of the playoffs, beating Skinner on a breakaway.

“It’s for the Stanley Cup, you know? … There’s not an inch out there. That’s a grown man’s game out there. It’s not for the faint of heart. Guys are putting everything on the line you know?”

Oilers defenseman Jake Walman

Skinner was chased in the third period after the Panthers’ fifth goal, which was scored on the power play by defenseman Aaron Ekblad after Skinner sailed the puck over the glass. After that, Skinner’s night was over.

Edmonton coach Kris Knoblauch said after the game that he hasn’t made a decision on his goaltending for Game 4, but that he didn’t think Skinner “had much chance on many of those goals” before being pulled.

Evan Rodrigues scored the Panthers’ sixth goal on the power play late in the third period, which was marred by eight misconduct penalties and a slew of other calls as Edmonton tried to send a late-game message.

“Both teams are going to stick up for each other. They care for each other. The core’s pretty much the same for both teams, the drivers of the team are the same for the last three years. They’ll always have each other’s backs,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said.

Walman said with the stakes this high, emotions were naturally going to boil over.

“It’s for the Stanley Cup, you know? … There’s not an inch out there. That’s a grown man’s game out there. It’s not for the faint of heart. Guys are putting everything on the line you know?” he said.

Edmonton gets two days to reset, with Game 4 Thursday night in Sunrise.

“I thought we got away from our game,” Oilers captain Connor McDavid said. “Part of that it’s due to chasing it a little bit. Part of that is obviously a credit to them. They played well. You find yourself in a hole, you’re going to do some uncharacteristic things and I thought we got away from our game a little bit there.”

If the Oilers are going to earn a split before heading back to Edmonton, they’ll need more from McDavid and Leon Draisaitl, their two superstar forwards and the first- and second-leading scorers in the playoffs.

This was just the 13th playoff game in which McDavid and Draisaitl both failed to record a point. The Oilers are 2-11 in those games. Draisaitl also failed to register a shot attempt in the game for just the second time in 93 playoff career games.

“Obviously it wasn’t our best. Not our best at all. I don’t think our best has shown up all series long,” said McDavid, “but it’s coming.”

SUNRISE, Fla. — Taking advantage of the Edmonton Oilers‘ worst performance in several weeks, the Florida Panthers pounced on mistakes to win Game 3 in a 6-1 rout Monday night and take a 2-1 series lead in the Stanley Cup Final.

Florida’s Brad Marchand, 37, became the oldest player to score in each of the first three games of a Final, while Sam Bennett added his NHL playoff-leading 14th goal after making a big hit on Edmonton’s Vasily Podkolzin that contributed to the turnover to spring him on a breakaway. Marchand and Bennett have combined to score eight goals for Florida, which was dominant in just about every way.

“We ended up playing what Florida kind of wanted,” said Oilers goalie Stuart Skinner, who got pulled after allowing five goals on 23 shots. “They were great tonight.”

And it was not just Bennett and Marchand. Carter Verhaeghe and Sam Reinhart each got their first goals of the series, Aaron Ekblad scored to chase Skinner and Evan Rodrigues added the exclamation point in the waning minutes.

“We’re a very deep team,” Marchand said. “That’s one of our strengths is the depth of the group from the front end to the back end to the goaltending.”

At the other end of the ice, Sergei Bobrovsky earned the “Bobby! Bobby!” chants from a fired-up South Florida crowd. The two-time Vezina Trophy-winning goaltender known as “Bob” was on his game for the very few quality chances the discombobulated Oilers mustered, making 32 saves.

“Nothing’s going to be perfect in the way we play,” Reinhart said. “This time of year, you need some world-class goaltending and that’s what we get consistently.”

Edmonton’s Corey Perry, at 40 the oldest player in the series, beat Bobrovsky with some silky hands for a power-play goal.

Connor McDavid could not get his team on track, and Edmonton took 15 minors — led by Evander Kane‘s three plus a misconduct to add up to 85 penalty minutes — including a brawl that ensued with less than 10 minutes left. Trent Frederic and Darnell Nurse, who fought Jonah Gadjovich, got misconducts that knocked them out of a game with an outcome determined long before.

“Emotions in all these games are extremely high,” Marchand said. “This is the time of year you want to be playing, and you’re enjoying every minute.”

After the Final looked as evenly matched as can be with Games 1 and 2 each needing extra time, overtime and then double OT, Game 3 was a lopsided mismatch. The Oilers came unglued to the point that Jake Walman resorted to squirting water on Panthers players on their bench from his spot on the visiting side.

The teams have some extra time off before Game 4 on Thursday night, when the Panthers, the defending Stanley Cup champions, have the chance to take a 3-1 lead and move to the verge of going back to back.

“Game 4 is a really big game,” McDavid said. “It’s a big swing game.”

Go ahead and count to 11. One. Two. Yada yada. Eleven.

That’s how many times the Florida Panthers have scored five or more goals in a single game this postseason. No, really. They did it twice against the Tampa Bay Lightning, three times to the Toronto Maple Leafs, four times against the Carolina Hurricanes, and after doing it in Game 2 to the Edmonton Oilers, they did it again Monday in a 6-1 romp in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final.

Scoring goals in bunches is clearly nothing new for the Panthers. But to give up more than five goals in a playoff game? Prior to Game 2, the last time the Oilers allowed that many in a single contest was in Game 1 of the Western Conference finals.

The Panthers taking a 2-1 series lead means the defending Stanley Cup champions are two wins away from repeating. Ryan S. Clark and Kristen Shilton examine how Game 3 played out, what players to watch going forward and what questions each team must answer going into Game 4 on Wednesday.

Florida got the better of Edmonton in every respect: It outworked, and simply outmatched, the Oilers at even strength and on special teams. The Panthers’ forecheck was relentless, they won more battles along the boards and, perhaps most critically, held Edmonton’s stars — and entire offense, really — at bay. That latter feat was due in large part to a sensational performance in net from Sergei Bobrovsky, who outplayed Stuart Skinner at the other end.

The Panthers were in control from the start as Brad Marchand scored less than a minute into the game, and they eventually got their power play going when Carter Verhaeghe lit the lamp on their fourth attempt of the first period. Sam Reinhart‘s response to Corey Perry‘s goal for Edmonton early in the second period, and Sam Bennett‘s breakaway after that, further cemented how dialed in Florida was.

Going in the third period up 4-1, knowing they were 30-1 in the postseason under Paul Maurice when leading after two, was all the positivity the Panthers needed to not just chase Skinner from the cage but also cruise to a resounding win. — Shilton

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Brad Marchand scores 56 seconds in to give Panthers early lead

Brad Marchand flicks it in through a crowd of defenders to give the Panthers an early lead vs. the Oilers.

Once again, the Oilers had another first period in which they gave up two goals, adding to what has been a chronic issue this series: slow starts. There were the struggles to retain the puck, only to then give up turnovers that led to goals. Take away the goal from Corey Perry that was set up by Evan Bouchard and the Oilers’ supporting cast struggled to make an impact, while Los Gatos had six different goal scorers.

The Oilers also couldn’t keep their cool, finishing with 85 penalty minutes, which is the most in a Cup Final game since 1986.

A series in which either the Oilers or Panthers could have taken a 2-0 lead after the first two contests gave way to a Game 3 that saw Edmonton struggle in several areas. Mounting comebacks has become a trademark this postseason, but the Oilers came into the third period of Game 3 trailing by three goals — a problem for several reasons. The last time a team came back from a three-goal deficit in the third period of a Cup Final game was in 1944, when the Montreal Canadiens did it against the Chicago Blackhawks. And after allowing a power-play goal early in the third period, Stuart Skinner was replaced by Calvin Pickard.

Those challenges added up to the Oilers’ worst game of the Cup Final — and perhaps their poorest performance since early in the first round against the Los Angeles Kings. — Clark

Players to watch in Game 4

It’s about time the Panthers’ captain enters the Cup Final (scoring) chat, right?

While Sam Bennett and Brad Marchand have four goals each in the series, Barkov has yet to register a single point and has just six shots on net. Of course, Barkov has been crushing big minutes (including 30-plus in that double-overtime victory in Game 2) and been tasked with trying to contain the Oilers’ top line, but still. That amount of ice time makes it even more perplexing that he has failed to find the score sheet by this point.

Barkov had six goals and 11 points through the Panthers’ first three playoff series, and was among their most consistent forwards. Something just hasn’t translated yet for him to the Final, where he has looked a half-step off throughout.

That can’t last. Barkov is too talented to not become a factor for Florida. It’s Oilers beware if he does. Given how the Panthers’ offense performed in Game 3 even without contributions from Barkov, seeing him catch fire too could be Edmonton’s worst nightmare. — Shilton

Guess we’re doing this again, aren’t we?

Goaltenders always face scrutiny, particularly in the postseason. After all, they have one of the few professions on the planet in which a red light, a loud horn and thousands of people openly celebrate their mistakes. Monday was the fourth time during these playoffs that Skinner has allowed more than five goals. The second time that happened, it led to the Oilers replacing him with Calvin Pickard in the first round. Pickard replaced him again in Game 3, stopping seven of eight shots in 16:33 of ice time. The most recent time that Skinner allowed more than five goals was followed by the Oilers rallying to win four straight to reach the Stanley Cup Final.

But how much of Game 3 can be placed on Skinner? The Oilers had 11 giveaways, gave up seven power-play chances and fell prey once again to giving up two unanswered goals in a period. So was Skinner the problem, or was he failed by the environment around him? — Clark

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Aaron Ekblad scores off beautiful Panthers passing

Aaron Ekblad makes the power play count as he slots home a blistering passing play by the Panthers vs. the Oilers.

Big questions for Game 4

Florida did an excellent job neutralizing McDavid and Draisaitl at 5-on-5 and on the power play, even when Kris Knoblauch was forced into pairing them together on a line midway through the second period in hopes it would spark the Oilers’ offense. That wasn’t the case, and it didn’t do much to improve things for McDavid and Draisaitl either.

Draisaitl had zero shot attempts by early in the third period. McDavid had two. Though Bobrovsky appeared particularly impenetrable, it was difficult for either of Edmonton’s stars to generate much opportunity in front of him anyway. By the end of the third period, Knoblauch might have elected to simply stop putting McDavid or Draisaitl over the boards at all given how the Oilers were imploding.

Regardless, whatever was working for Florida in that respect needs to be bottled and reopened for Game 4. The Oilers were able to make Barkov uncomfortable when they were dictating matchups, but on Florida’s home ice the Panthers were able to respond by stymying Edmonton’s two elite scorers. If the Panthers can re-create that performance Thursday, there’s a real chance they can take a stranglehold on this series when it flips back to Edmonton for Game 5. — Shilton

Can the Oilers fix what has gone wrong with their defensive structure as of late?

A breakaway goal from Brad Marchand in Game 2 got the Panthers on the board, and a second breakaway goal from him in double overtime is how they tied the series. Never mind the Sam Reinhart breakaway that could have ended Game 2 during the first overtime.

Allowing three goals halfway through Game 3 was already going to lead to questions about what happened to the Oilers’ defensive scheme. But the Panthers taking a 4-1 lead in the second period via Sam Bennett’s breakaway presented another potential concern around the Oilers.

There have already been moments in this series in which the Panthers have had a shot share of more than 65%. As noted above, the Oilers also gave up two unanswered goals in a period, something that has happened six times through the first nine periods of the series. Establishing a sense of defensive continuity had been a hallmark this postseason for the Oilers. But in this series, a lack of defensive consistency has led to them falling into a 2-1 hole. — Clark

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Sam Bennett slots home Panthers’ 4th goal

Sam Bennett fools the goaltender as he tucks in the Panthers’ fourth goal on the breakaway vs. the Oilers.