shesterkin is one of the best starters in the league, and skinner is one of the worst, but the oilers are a deeper team. a quick and dirty and somewhat arbitrary look at it:

( 1st thing is # of players over 1 point per 60 at 5v5 in regular season, 2nd is same but in playoffs. 3rd is regular season team xg%, 4th is playoff xg% )

oilers: 14 / 11 players, 57% xg / 51%
panthers: 12 / 12 players, 57% xg / 55%
stars: 17 / 9 players, 56% xg / 53%
rangers: 12 / 8 players, 49% xg / 41%

canes: 16 / 11 players, 58% xg / 54%


rangers best 5v5 performers in the playoffs*, ordered: lafreniere, trochek, panarin, goodrow, roslovic, vesey, zibanejad, kreider
* - also the fact that fox was outscored by trouba leads me to believe that the former was playing injured, which stings

that ... is not good. or deep. the rag$ low key kinda suck but are being boosted by an elite goalie, and it's a damn shame that the canes choked vs them, because they are a good team and would have made for a better ecf, and maybe scf. (sorry heals)

one other interesting note i saw was how the oilers have been a much better 1st period team, while the panthers have been much better in the 3rd. so don't be surprised if this trend continues of the oilers getting a lead and then turtling to hell in order to hang on

So 72, who wins the series?

I might have talked myself into betting Florida here

panthers in 6 feels most likely, but who the hell knows right? loilers certainly in with a shot

Oil in 5

Legit think it will be a short series won by the Oilers. From Oilers writer Jonathan Willis:

5v5 expected goals, regular season:
Edmonton 57.1% / Florida 54.3%

The team with the better regular season 5v5 expected goal share has won 11 of 14 series in these playoffs.

In 2 of 3 exceptions, the winner had vastly superior special teams (something Florida does not have). The last exception was NYR vs. CAR. NYR had worse 5v5 xGF% and comparably excellent special teams. Thanks to a massive finishing/goaltending disparity - .915 for NYR, .873 for CAR - NYR managed to outscore CAR by a single goal and advance.

Expected goals% and NHL rank, regular season:
1. EDM: 57%
3. EDM's R3 opp: 55%
4. EDM's R1 opp: 55%
5. FLA: 54%
8. EDM's R2 rd. opp: 52%
18. FLA's R2 opp: 50%
21. FLA's R1 opp: 49%
22. FLA's R3 opp: 49%

oilers 5v4 regular season: 2nd in goals for rate, 3rd in xgf rate
panthers 5v4 regular season: 8th in goals for rate, 2nd in xgf rate

oilers regular season 4v5: 18th in goals against rate, 3rd in xga rate
panthers regular season 4v5: 3rd in goals against rate, 2nd in xga rate


florida has good special teams, as do the oilers, but their lol goaltending situation explains the difference between their expected and actual powerplay goals against. oilers special teams have been running insanely well in the playoffs, will that continue for 4-7 more games? who knows, but the panthers special teams should put them to the test.

and while both teams took a lot of penalties in the regular season, the panthers also drew a lot of them (4th most), but the oilers did not (2nd worst, only ahead of the sharks). might as well try to get out ahead of this in case the panthers get more pps in the final and we never hear the end of it...

yup thats mcbust as f3 getting burnt by barkov and thus it's a 3v2 from the other blueline basically. bing bang boom, way too easy
1-0

ding ding ding

I bet Panthers series -137

McDavid looks defeated already

ekholm getting danced by and forced to haul down ... *checks notes* kyle okposo, in ... *checks notes* the year of our lord 2024. you really truly do hate to see it

Oilers give 97-29 a shift after the PK and all the shots taken are blueline bombs. Sigh

Breaking news!

Salary cap will be $88 million for next season, $300,000 more than it was going too be.

BOB


tbf the panthers seemed to be breaking their man defensive system there to do the all 5 collapse to the net thing, so i get it


oh ****, can buy like 1/4 of a min player for that

Oilers gonna lose.

Canadian teams don't win the cup in this era.

Yup LOL

McDavid demanding a trade watch back on!

Well 72o was right about the Oilers having the better first period, just wrong about having anything to hold on for dear life to

lol, can't win em all

the difference between having an average goalie and a bad one. i think the goal was the panthers only good scoring chance in the entire period. you had one job, begging you to make a single goddamn save. *sigh*

and completely preventable, just a lazy bonehead play by mcdavid for a second, and that's all it takes

oh snap!

dump the puck into cody ceci's coaches corner, instant clean recovery
2-0

Just one of those games eh

+525 for Edmonton to win on BetMGM at the moment, lol