The Florida Panthers defeated the Edmonton Oilers 3-0 in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise, Florida, on Saturday.
Here are some immediate takeaways from the game by NHL.com staff writer Tracey Myers:
Star of the game
Magnificent, stellar, spectacular, pick a positive description: Sergei Bobrovsky was all of them. He made 32 saves, including a couple of outstanding ones, en route to the third postseason shutout of his career. We’ll highlight one of those saves below.
Goal of the game
Leave it to Carter Verhaeghe to get the Panthers going with what would be the game-winning goal, right? The forward chipped in a backhand cross-ice pass from Aleksander Barkov on a 3-on-2 rush to score the 25th playoff goal of his career and give the Panthers a 1-0 lead at 3:59 of the first period.
Save of the game
We could pick a few Bobrovsky highlights, but let’s go with his save on Ryan Nugent-Hopkins. On Edmonton’s first power play of the game, Nugent-Hopkins got behind the Panthers and skated in alone on Bobrovsky, who made the save with his outstretched left pad to turn away the Oilers forward’s backhand shot at 15:58 of the first.
