Panthers blow lead, Oilers even Stanley Cup Final series

SUNRISE, Fla. — The game probably shouldn’t have gotten to this point.

Not after the Florida Panthers built a three-goal lead after a nearly perfect first period.

Not after they essentially had the Edmonton Oilers on the ropes.

But if this Stanley Cup Final series has proven anything, it’s that neither team is out of it until the final horn sounds — or, in the case of three of four games now — until the final goal goes in the back of the net beyond regulation.

The Oilers mounted their comeback, tying the game in the second and briefly going up in the third.

Then Florida put together one final desperation push, with Sam Reinhart tying the game with 19.5 seconds left in regulation.

And then Edmonton made the final strike, with Leon Draisaitl scoring 11:18 into overtime to seal the Oilers’ 5-4 win in Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final on Thursday at Amerant Bank Arena.

The best-of-7 series is now tied 2-2. Game 5 is Saturday at 8 p.m. from Edmonton’s Rogers Place.

“We’re flat now,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said of the series. “Best two out of three.”

It was the latest dramatic affair in a series that has lived up to the hype.

Each of the first two games also required overtime, with Edmonton erasing a third-period deficit each time. They split those matchups — Edmonton winning Game 1 with just over 30 seconds left in overtime, Florida winning Game 2 8:05 into double overtime.

A 6-1 Panthers rout in Game 3 has been the anomaly, but Game 4 on Thursday returned to what the Panthers expected to get from this series.

“This is as good as this thing gets,” Maurice said. “This is Christmas, this is the payoff.”

Florida almost got the payoff it wanted when Reinhart buried Matthew Tkachuk’s feed from the left circle past Calvin Pickard to tie the game at 4-4. The tally was the latest game-tying goal in a Stanley Cup playoff game in Panthers history — and the second-latest game-tying goal in Stanley Cup Final history behind Corey Perry’s goal with 17.8 seconds left in Game 2 of the series.

“Unreal,” defenseman Aaron Ekblad said. “Pure elation and excitement on the bench.”

The feeling didn’t last. After each team had chances through the first half of overtime, the Oilers took advantage of a poorly timed Panthers line change that allowed Draisaitl to get open in the offensive zone. He muscled a backhanded shot that Florida goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky got a piece of but couldn’t fully contain before it went into the net.

“Once again shows you or tells you that our group never quits,” Draisaitl said. “I think we believe that no matter how bad it is if we get over that hump of adversity we’re going to keep pushing, we’re going to keep coming, we’re going to keep coming and eventually it’ll break. You don’t want to be in these situations too many times, but when they happen, I think we’re great at it.”

This game needed overtime because Edmonton mounted a ferocious comeback after falling into a three-goal first-period deficit.

Florida jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first period on a pair of Matthew Tkachuk power-play goals — one at five-on-three, another at 5-on-4 — and an Anton Lundell goal set up by a Carter Verhaeghe forecheck behind the Oilers’ net.

“We carried play in the first,” Tkachuk said.

The Panthers’ first period was so dominant — Florida leading 34-15 in shot attempts, 17-7 in shots on goal, 22-5 in scoring chances and 13-2 in high-danger chances — that Edmonton pulled starting goaltender Stuart Skinner for backup Calvin Pickard for a second consecutive game.

But the Oilers, who were fighting for their playoff life trying not to go down 3-1 in the series, weren’t going to go down easy.

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins scored on the power play 3:33 into the second period; 3-1.

Then Darnell Nurse scored top shelf from a wide angle 12:47 into the frame; 3-2.

And then Vasily Podkolzin took a Nurse rebound and fired it into the back of the net 15:05 into the period.

Just like that, it’s 3-3 going into the second intermission.

“We were a little bit slow,” Reinhart said of the second period. “I think we were watching the play develop as opposed to playing on our toes, and that’s obviously how they got back in the game.”

The Panthers came out in the third with some serious jump and generated most of the scoring chances through the early going of the final frame but couldn’t get anything past Pickard. They staved off a dangerous power-play opportunity from Edmonton in that span as well, with Sergei Bobrovsky robbing Corey Perry with a save that went off the blades of his skate.

But Edmonton managed to take advantage of a long Panthers shift and executed when it got in Florida’s zone. Kasperi Kapanen got the puck in the slot from Nugent-Hopkins, paused for a moment and then pushed the puck to Wallman, whose slap shot got past Bobrovsky to give Edmonton its only lead of regulation.

Reinhart gave the Panthers life, but only for so long.

And now the series is tied as it shifts back to Edmonton.

“The result at the end sucks, it does, but what are you going to do?” Tkachuk said. “The team that moves on from this, and team that recovers the fastest is going to have the bigger advantage on Saturday. That’s it.”