Oilers, fans pumped for Game 6 of Cup Final, unlikely comeback bid

EDMONTON -- The Edmonton Oilers made it to the last possible home game of the season, and they expect it to be epic.

The Oilers trail 3-2 in the best-of-7 Stanley Cup Final and will host Game 6 against the Florida Panthers at Rogers Place on Friday (8 p.m. ET; CBC, TVAS, SN, ESPN+, ABC). They last played in a home game of this magnitude in the 2006 Final, when they defeated the Carolina Hurricanes 4-0 to send the series to a winner-take-all Game 7 in Raleigh, North Carolina. Edmonton lost that game 3-1.

The goal is to return the 2024 Final back to Florida for Game 7 on Monday.

“It’s exciting,” Oilers captain Connor McDavid said Thursday. “It’s exciting to be back in Edmonton, exciting to play in front of our fans and play in this building.”

The entire city seems to have embraced the Oilers’ run to the Final, and every game has featured an outdoor watch party at ICE District Plaza, nicknamed the Moss Pit after longtime dressing room attendant Joey Moss, who died in 2020.

Edmonton is awash with Oilers jerseys, banners and car flags. The city has not celebrated a Stanley Cup championship since 1990.

“It’s pretty incredible to witness,” said forward Corey Perry, who is in his first season with the Oilers. “Coming in for the playoffs (with the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim/Anaheim Ducks) the two years (2006 and 2017), you don’t know because you’re not from here. You don't really pay attention to it. You’re just here to play a hockey game.

“But you really see what’s going on around the city here now. All the people coming down outside, the watch parties, everybody notices it. You can hear them honking the horns when we’re in our dressing room. You can hear everything. It's pretty special, pretty tremendous to be here and going through that.”

Edmonton is trying to become the second team to battle back from a 3-0 series deficit in the Final to win the Stanley Cup. Of the 28 teams previously in that position, only the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs were able to accomplish it, defeating the Detroit Red Wings.

The Oilers are halfway there. An 8-1 win in Game 4 at home and a 5-3 victory in Game 5 on the road have them, and the city, believing that completing the comeback is possible.

“Our backs are against the wall. There’s no easy way to put it,” Perry said. “So, you have to have that [same] mindset as we’ve gone into Game 4, in Game 5. It has to be the exact same way.

“We have to come out, we have to get that jump early. We’ve done that the last couple of games and never looked back. This game, you have to be ready to play each and every night. You never know what’s going to happen. We’re excited to come home and play in front of our fans. We feel comfortable coming home and playing here. These fans, they give us that extra boost.”

Playing in a Canadian market, Oilers players have always been recognizable around the city, but this run during the Stanley Cup Playoffs has extended their fame, according to defenseman Mattias Ekholm, who is in his second season with Edmonton.

“It’s been different for sure, especially this playoff run,” Ekholm said. “People are excited, people are happy. It’s a great thing at the end of the day.

“I actually went to our community league soccer game yesterday for my son and he comes running up to me and says, ‘Daddy, my teammate wants to meet you.’ There are some challenges with that, but we’re embracing it and it’s fun. People around here love hockey, obviously, and those are just some things that pop up every once in a while. We’ve loved our time here and still do, and I don’t have anything bad to say.”

Just like Edmonton’s run to the Final in 2006, this year’s trip has been full of memorable moments to be cherished for a long time. The Oilers are hoping to top it all off with a Stanley Cup win, which would help cement McDavid’s legacy as one of the best players of all time.

“You spend your life working to get into a position like this and you think that when you’re here there is going to be some magic feeling, but you don’t know what to expect,” McDavid said. “It’s all been pretty normal. This has always been part of the plan for our group to be in a position like this, playing big games at home, big moments, and it’s just another one tomorrow night.”

McDavid said he has not thought about what his lasting iconic moment might be if the Oilers are able to pull off the comeback.

“They’re a byproduct of all the work that we’ve done throughout the regular season, all the work that we’ve done throughout this run,” he said. “Those moments are products of guys that are ready for the big moments, and there’s no group that is more ready for the moment than this one here.”