Oilers Must Regain Composure vs. Panthers

Just about everything that could go wrong for the Edmonton Oilers in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final Monday night went wrong in a humiliating 6-1 road loss to the Florida Panthers.

Credit where it's due, the Panthers played a near-perfect game on Monday. They scored early and often, protected Sergei Bobrovsky incredibly well and avoided costly turnovers almost entirely.

That said, many of the Oilers' struggles were entirely self-inflicted. Namely, they racked up a whopping 85 penalty minutes on the night, consisting of 15 minor penalties, a major and five game misconducts. The Panthers scored three goals on 11 power play opportunities, while the Oilers only scored on one of their six.

The first period was indicative of what's to come, as Edmonton took four minors in the opening frame alone.

“It was a weird game, obviously when you start in the first with four penalties, that means half a period you’re killing and it’s not a good way to get into your game,” star forward Connor McDavid said, per NHL.com. “I thought a lot of power plays and penalty killing either way, we never got to our game.”

However, tensions truly boiled over in the third period. With the game well out of hand, the Oilers simply lost control of their emotions. Mattias Ekholm, Darnell Nurse, Trent Frederic, Evander Kane and Kasperi Kapanen all received game misconducts in the final frame, the former three all coming in one fell swoop.

“The third period is an unravelling,” Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch said. “The game is out of hand. I don’t think we would have acted or played like that had it been a one-goal, or two-goal game. I think our guys were just boys being boys and trying to make investment for the next game.”

If there's one opponent that teams can't lose their composure against, it's the Panthers. Matthew Tkachuk, Sam Bennett and Brad Marchand are some of the league's best at getting under their opponents' skin, and Monday's game showed just how out of hand things can get when tensions boil over.

The good news is that the Oilers have a chance to tie the series at 2-2 in Game 4 on Thursday night. After being down 3-0 in last year's final, going back to Edmonton with a tie would be ideal.