EDMONTON — It’s almost at a point where the Edmonton Oilers penalty killers can’t wait to get on the ice.
Edmonton has clawed back from a 3-0 deficit in the Stanley Cup Final to tie the best-of-7 series in large part due to the play of its penalty-killing unit.
The Oilers penalty kill was 3-for-3 in a 5-1 win in Game 6 at here at Rogers Place on Friday and is 18-for-19 in the series. Edmonton has killed off 46 of its past 47 penalties and 21 straight at home. It has a playoff best 94.1 percent efficiency rating in 24 games (64-for-68).
“We’re playing with instinct and fast and closing things down, and when the block needs to be made the guys are making blocks, it’s good,” Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse said. “I like what we’re doing, and I think for us, even when we have success, we’re always trying to evolve and be even more on our toes, and (assistant coach) Mark Stuart does a great job of preparing us for the game. It’s been good, been instinctual, been fast, shutting stuff down, but we have to do it again.”
Stuart was put in charge of the penalty kill when coach Kris Knoblauch was hired on Nov. 12. He put together three pairs of forwards who rotate through along with five defensemen. All have taken enormous pride in getting their job done 30 seconds at a time.
“We’re just working together, we know how we need to have success and we’ve been doing it, we’ve been clicking together well and it’s just putting tons of pressure on them and not giving them anything easy at all,” Oilers forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins said. “I think with anything, confidence goes a long way. We’ve done a good job. The hardest job is going to be Monday and we’re looking forward to it.”
The Oilers penalty kill has outscored the Panthers power play in the series.
Mattias Janmark scored a short-handed goal to get the Oilers started in an 8-1 win in Game 4, and Connor Brown opened Game 5, a 5-3 win in Florida, with a short-handed goal.
Evan Rodrigues scored the only power-play goal for Florida in the series, in a 4-1 win in Game 2.
Game 7 of the series is at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise, Florida, on Monday (8 p.m. ET; ABC, ESPN+, SN, TVAS, CBC).
“They’re prepared and know what they’re doing, and I think we have a good system for the group that we have,” Knoblauch said. “Confidence is an amazing thing where you see with one player gets on a roll and scores goals or whatever it is, but now we have six or seven forwards, four or five defensemen that have that same confidence and being able to work together on the penalty.
“We do have breakdowns, there are things that don’t go perfectly, that’s where your goaltender has to come up big and ‘Stuey’ [Stuart Skinner] has been outstanding.”
