‘If I can win the Masters’: McIlroy believes Maple Leafs can end Cup drought

Despite all the heartbreak, there’s still at least one person who Be-Leafs.

EDMONTON — We thought the Los Angeles Kings ran a crowded neutral zone, but now you watch the Florida Panthers lay their forecheck down, and you see what a real neutral zone is supposed to look like. A Stanley Cup-winning neutral zone.

It seemed like Vegas won its battles, or that the Dallas Stars had skill and goaltending. Then you play Florida, and it’s an entirely different animal.

But then the game ends, and even though you perhaps didn’t play a lot better than you did a year ago in a 3-0 Game 1 loss, you’ve won. And you’ve pumped four pucks past Sergei Bobrovsky in the process, equalling your output in the first three games of last year’s Stanley Cup Final.

Different?

Every single thing about this Game 1 was different for the Edmonton Oilers — from electrifying start to captivating finish — in a thrilling 4-3 overtime win to open this Cup Final.

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“It felt completely different,” confirmed goaltender Stuart Skinner, who outduelled Bobrovsky by a hair in Game 1. “When I saw the Cup on the ice last year, I was kind of looking at it with googly eyes.

“This year seeing it, it’s ‘I was here last year. I saw it. It’s time to get back to work and do my thing.’ It definitely felt completely different.”

Against a Florida team that was an incredible 29-0 when leading after 40 minutes under Paul Maurice in the playoffs, the Oilers came back from a 3-1 deficit in Period 2 and a 3-2 deficit after 40 minutes to draw first blood in this Final.

Blessed with a power play when Tomas Nosek drifted a clearing attempt over the glass late in overtime, the Oilers’ power play diffused an aggressive Florida penalty kill the only way you can: With skill and speedy puck movement.

Three quick passes — Evan Bouchard, to Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, to Corey Perry, and a deft feed to Connor McDavid — stretched the Panthers’ box past its limit, and suddenly the best passer on earth had the puck, while the NHL’s most dangerous shooter swooped into the slot.

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One helpless Panther defender was in between McDavid and Draisaitl, and he was as chanceless as chanceless can be as hockey’s most dynamic duo did what they do better than any one pair in the sport today.

“I’m standing over there watching this whole thing unfold,” said Draisaitl, who had the first and last goals on the night, with his parents in the stands, all the way from Cologne, Germany. “The work is done way before (his goal). It’s four really good plays. (Perry) with a great play to Davo and then an amazing pass over.

“Then, obviously, I’m the beneficiary.”

The “beneficiary” now has three overtime goals in these playoffs, tying a playoff record held by teammate Corey Perry and Florida’s Matthew Tkachuk.

Draisaitl was so banged up a year ago, he went seven games without a goal. He scored 1:06 into this Cup Final, then closed the game with a classic one-time snipe on a silky pass from his partner in crime — just another upgrade on last year’s Oilers squad that the Panthers are going to have to figure out.

“We don’t win the game tonight without him, so that tells you that story,” Mattias Ekholm said of Draisaitl. “He’s one of the top two guys on our team, and maybe in the league. They’re phenomenal out there. He just looks very confident, very, very comfortable. He’s doing his thing.”

Meanwhile, Ekholm scored to become the 20th different goal scorer for Edmonton this postseason, matching a franchise record set in 1984.

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Yes, the big boys closed this game out for Edmonton, but it was a fourth-line goal by Viktor Arvidsson — aided by Vasily Podkolzin, found money that shook loose from the Vancouver Canucks pockets last summer — who breathed life and lust into a quiet house moments after the Panthers had jumped ahead 3-1.

It was Kasperi Kapanen who had two assists and was an eyelash away from ending it in OT, and a defence corps with only one Oiler (Bouchard) logging over 30 minutes while Florida had three such D-men.

“It takes everyone. How many times are we going to say that. It takes everybody,” repeated McDavid. “I thought that whole (Mattias) Janmark line was dangerous all night. Arvie had a big goal… Pods makes a great play, (Kapanen) as well. That would have been a pretty special goal there if he’d gotten that breakaway.

“We’ve got lots of players who are playing well at the right time.”

Instalment I of Edmonton-Florida lived up to its billing, a riveting display of hockey played at the highest pedigree. As competitive, skilled, fast and furious as the game can be played between club teams — perhaps fewer stars than at a 4 Nations tournament, but with systems play that is far more ingrained.

If this is what we’re going to get for the next two weeks, then buckle up, folks.

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“It’s potential to be just a spectacular seven-game, up and down the ice,” said Florida head coach Paul Maurice. “It’s still fast. There isn’t any casualness and there’s no BS in either team’s game. The pucks go deep that are supposed to go deep. I think we had maybe two all night that we didn’t like our decision off the line. They didn’t fool around with it, either.

“It was honest. It was hard. It was fast and it was tight. It was an overtime game.”

And on this night, it went Edmonton’s way.

Three wins to go, and they can’t come any harder than this.

It’s how it’s supposed to be.