Edmonton Oilers forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins will be keeping his own blog throughout the 2024 Stanley Cup Final against the Florida Panthers. He will check in regularly with behind-the-scenes access.
In his fourth entry, Nugent-Hopkins discusses Game 3 on Thursday, the first Stanley Cup Final game ever played at Rogers Place, and the first in Edmonton since 2006. He also writes about what he will do on his off day and how the Oilers, who trail 3-0 in the best-of-7 series, are approaching Game 4 at home on Saturday (8 p.m. ET; CBC, TVAS, SN, ESPN+, ABC).
It was an amazing atmosphere for Game 3. We knew that coming in. It was the first experience of having a Stanley Cup Final game here, a long time for the fans and first-time ever for most of us, so for all of us in Edmonton. Obviously you want to get a win for the fans. Unfortunately, we weren't able to do that but that doesn’t mean that they were any quieter than we expected them to be.
The fans' support is huge. It makes you want to play harder for them and score for them and it just gives you life. I think to start the game, it really just gives you that kind of energy boost that you need and through different times. Even when we're trying to score 6-on-5 at the end and they're extremely loud and everybody's cheering together, it gives you a little life.
As for the rest of today, with my daughter, who is almost 10 months old, there is not a lot of TV, right? But my parents and my brother are here so we'll see them at some point. I have two dogs, too, so we'll take them for a walk and hopefully it's a nice day so you can be outside a little bit, which is always nice. But yeah, I mean, same thing as the other day, just to try to have a normal day, but of course thinking about it. But try to enjoy the day.
As for tomorrow, we just have to go win a hockey game, that’s our focus. It’s still the Stanley Cup Final, so it's still a ton of fun. When your backs are against the wall like this, you have to lean on each other and we've done that all season. So you don't want to do this with anybody but the group that you have.
I know this: We believe in each other, and this group has gone through some stuff even just this season, so it's exciting, and we still have a great opportunity here.
