Dave Hyde: Big-Game Bob carries the Panthers to Game 1 win in Stanley Cup Final
SUNRISE — Again at the end of the night, after Sergei Bobrovsky stopped his 32nd and final shot, going down to the ice on his knees to smother the puck, the chant started in the arena with a rising energy as the finish line neared.
“Bob-by! Bob-by!’’ the home crowd chanted.
This was the first South Florida crowd to witness Game 1 of a Stanley Cup Final, and the first to watch the Panthers take the lead in the championship series with a 3-0 win against Edmonton. This chant, background noise for much of the night, became an anthem saluting the story of the night one more time.
“Bob-by! Bob-by!”
This, to be sure, wasn’t the Panthers’ blueprint to victory, watching two Edmonton breakaways in the first period, letting their big guns get repeated chances on Bobrovsky’s doorstep and flirting with disaster by giving up three power-play chances in the first two periods.
“We had our chances,’’ as Edmonton coach Kris Knoblauch said.
The Panthers had Bobrovsky. Big-Game Bob was like Playoff Jimmy Butler so often for the Miami Heat. He was the night’s difference. We’re not used to seeing the Panthers outshot, 32-18, as happened in Game 1. They went 10 minutes without a shot in one stretch. Edmonton had an 18-6 advantage in “high-danger” chances, according to the site analytic site, Natural State Trick.
z“I just play my structure and just try to squeeze the gap and just do my best to (make the) stop,’’ Bobrovsky said. “We re-set, get ready for the next one.”
He is like that, machine-like, implacable, restrained with his words in public as much as movement in the crease. He showed a talent for conservation not just of body parts in making saves, but of psyche, when perhaps the second-best offensive player in the game, Leon Draisaitl, made a crisp, cross-ice pass to the best player alone by the net early in the third period.
Connor McDavid, as he had been so much this game, was in his personal kill zone on that play. Bobrovsky coolly moved across the crease for the save. That’s how it was from the opening seconds of Game 1 when Edmonton’s Zach Hyman was alone with the puck before Bobrovsky as the recipient of a Panthers turnover.
Hyman had 54 goals this season. So, he knows what to do with a puck as much McDavid and Draisaitl. But Bobrovsky stood firm, his body in proper position, the first shot of the Final going off his mask.
“Cracked it with his head,’’ Panthers coach Paul Maurice said.
That was just the start of a night that needed Olympic judges to score Bobrovsky’s best save.
Florida Panthers bench watches the clock tick down in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky makes one of his 33 saves in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday.(Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers head coach Paul Maurice yells at his team in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers fans threw rats on the ice after their victoryin Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky (72) denied the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Edmonton Oilers center Connor McDavid (97) has words with Florida Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad (5) in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers fans threw rats on the ice after their victoryin Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky (72) gives his stick to a young fan after Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers defeated the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky (72) denied the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers defeated the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Fans cheer on the Florida Panthers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Florida Panthers defenseman Brandon Montour (62) against Edmonton Oilers left wing Dylan Holloway (55) in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Edmonton Oilers left wing Dylan Holloway (55) with the puck against Florida Panthers defenseman Dmitry Kulikov (7) in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Fans celebrate before the Florida Panthers take on the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Bill Yates and Janet Yuen with Stanley C. Panther before the Florida Panthers take on the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Fans celebrate before the Florida Panthers take on the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Dwayne Stanford wears a rat hat before the Florida Panthers take on the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Kristin Avery hoists a mini-Stanley Cup before the Florida Panthers take on the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Alex Butsky and Prashant Kaushik hold a mini-Stanley Cup before the Florida Panthers take on the Edmonton Oilers in Game 1 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise on Saturday, June 8, 2024. (Mike Stocker/South Florida Sun Sentinel)
Was it when Ryan Nugent-Hopkins skated in alone from the blue line on Bobrovsky, who stuck out a leg for the save? Or was it a one-two combination of shots on Edmonton’s third power play, the second of which was a McDavid backhand alone in front of the net?
“Every goalie has strengths and weaknesses,’’ Knoblauch said. “Every system has strength and weaknesses. And then, there’s luck.”
Ah, puck luck. That’s part of it. The question simmered after Saturday if Edmonton would be happy playing seven games like this and taking their chances. The Panthers made full use of their scant chances.
“They played good,” as the Panthers’ Matthew Tkachuk said. “We played good enough.”
Edmonton had outshot the Panthers early in the second period, 17-5, but the Panthers scored two goals worth framing. The first was a tic-tac-toe Sam Reinhart-to-Aleksander Barkov-to-Carter Verhaeghe textbook play for the goal.
The second was equally representative of the Panthers. Sam Bennett chased down a puck he dumped behind the Edmonton net and won the battle on the boards for it. He then passed out front to Evan Rodrigues, who buried it over Edmonton goalie Stuart Skinner’s shoulder.
That’s all Bobrovsky needed. You can’t pry thoughts out of him on what winning the Stanley Cup would mean to him.
“I’m here for the guys playing, not for myself,’’ he said. “I’m nothing without them.”
Only two players in this series are older than Bobrovsky at 35. The Panthers’ fourth-line center, Kyle Okposo, is 36. Edmonton’s third-line wing, Corey Perry, is 39. So, neither has the demands or the stage of Bobrovsky.
This might be his last chance, too. If so, if Game 1, is an indication, he’ll make the most of it. He saved every Edmonton shot and, in so doing, saved the Panthers’ night.
