 | Today we're putting a bow on Florida's second straight Stanley Cup championship and looking ahead to the NHL off-season (and beyond). Plus, the Canadian men's soccer team starts strong at the Gold Cup, and Canada's Marie-Philip Poulin wins a big women's hockey award. | | | Florida won the Cup. Again. Now what?
| | | The Florida Panthers repeated as Stanley Cup champions last night, destroying the dispirited Edmonton Oilers 5-1 on home ice to finish off their rematch in six games.
Sam Reinhart, who had the go-ahead goal in Florida's 2-1 victory in Game 7 last year, played the hero once again. He scored four times, including a fantastic effort early in the first period and a pair of empty-netters in the third, to become the first player in 103 years with four goals in a Cup-clinching win. Reinhart also equalled Wayne Gretzky, Mike Bossy and Jean Beliveau for the modern-era record for goals in a Stanley Cup final with seven.
The Conn Smythe Trophy for playoff MVP went to Florida's Sam Bennett, who led all playoff scorers with 15 goals, including a record 13 on the road. Matthew Tkachuk scored the second goal last night to tie Bennett for the team lead in points with 23, then revealed that he played with a torn adductor muscle and a sports hernia suffered while competing for the United States at the 4 Nations Face-Off in February.
The Panthers are just the 10th team in NHL history to repeat as Stanley Cup champions, but the third to do it in the last 10 years, joining Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay.
On the other side, the Oilers are the first team to lose back-to-back Cup finals since Don Cherry's Boston Bruins fell to Montreal in 1977 and '78. And, we have to bring it up one last time: Canada's Stanley Cup drought will now reach 33 years.
A few thoughts to wrap up the series:
* So much for that "classic" Cup final we thought we were witnessing as the Oilers won the opener in overtime and the Panthers took Game 2 in double OT, with Edmonton superstars Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl combining for nine points in those contests. Florida's other three wins were all blowouts (aggregate score: 16-4), while McDavid had just two points over the final four games and finished with one goal in the series.
* Speaking of McDavid, he remains the best player in NHL history to have never won the Stanley Cup. With apologies to 700-goal scorers Marcel Dionne and Mike Gartner, 1,500-point man Joe Thornton, Hall of Famer Jarome Iginla and whichever personal favourite you want to throw in here, the 28-year-old McDavid has already won five Art Ross Trophies, three Harts and a Conn Smythe. Except for Alex Ovechkin, who won his lone championship in 2018, every other player with three or more regular-season MVP awards has hoisted the Cup at least twice.
* After 10 seasons in the league, it feels like McDavid ought to have a ring. Gretzky won his first Cup in his fifth NHL season, and Mario Lemieux broke through in his seventh. But sometimes it just takes a little longer: Steve Yzerman waited 14 years, Ovechkin 13, and Ray Bourque famously didn't win one until his 22nd and final season. McDavid will get his at some point. Right?
* The Corey Perry Curse continues. Despite matching his career high with 10 goals in the playoffs, the 40-year-old Oilers forward lost his fifth Cup final (with four different teams) in the last six years. Perry won a ring with Anaheim back in 2007 (his second year in the league) and added a Hart Trophy in 2011, so he's pretty much done it all. With his modest one-year, $1.15-million US contract about to expire, it'll be interesting to see if he returns (to Edmonton or elsewhere) for another kick at the can.
* Not to go all sports-radio-segment on you, but yes, the Panthers are a dynasty. They've won two consecutive Cups, reached three straight finals, and the year before that they captured the Presidents' Trophy. Sure, it's not quite on par with the early-'80s Islanders winning four Cups in a row or Gretzky's Oilers grabbing four in five years. But the Panthers' four-year run is about as good as it gets in the salary-cap era.
What's next in the NHL
The draft is coming up on June 27 and 28 in Los Angeles, where the Islanders have the top pick after overcoming their 3.5 per cent odds to win last month's lottery. Defenceman Matthew Schaefer of the OHL's Erie Otters is the top-rated prospect despite his season being cut short by a broken collarbone while playing for Canada at the world junior championship in December. Here's a mock draft from NHL.com showing where the other top prospects might go.
Free agency opens on July 1. Mitch Marner's seemingly imminent split with the Maple Leafs is getting all the press, and he's widely considered the top player on the market. But the NHL is a copy-cat league (aren't they all?) and an easy way to try and replicate the Panthers' gritty brand of success is by poaching their key players. Florida's pending UFAs include the Conn Smythe Trophy-winning Bennett, top defenceman Aaron Ekblad and the incomparable Brad Marchand, who scored 10 goals in the playoffs — including six in the final — after being acquired from Boston at the trade deadline.
Other notables available include Toronto's John Tavares, Winnipeg's Nikolaj Ehlers and Vancouver's Brock Boeser. Here's a look at the top 12 free agents from Sportsnet.
The 2025-26 season opens on Oct. 7, and the first half will surely revolve around who gets picked to play in the Winter Olympics in Italy in February. All 12 teams in the men's tournament announced their initial six players on Monday, with Canada naming McDavid, Sidney Crosby, Nathan MacKinnon, Brayden Point, Cale Makar and, presciently, Reinhart. The rival United States chose Matthew and Brady Tkachuk, Auston Matthews, Jack Eichel, Charlie McAvoy and Quinn Hughes.
After those incredibly intense and entertaining Canada-U.S clashes at the 4 Nations Face-Off, which ended with McDavid's overtime goal to beat the Americans in the final, there's sure to be plenty of excitement about the first Olympic hockey tournament with NHL players since 2014. And (maybe depending on the state of Canada-U.S. relations this winter) the gold medal might even surpass the Stanley Cup as the biggest prize of the 2025-26 hockey season. | | |  | Conn Smythe Trophy winner Sam Bennett and the Florida Panthers are on an incredible four-year run including back-to-back Stanley Cups. (Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)
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| | | A couple other things to know:
1. The Canadian men's soccer team dominated its Gold Cup opener.
Canada, ranked 30th in the world, crushed No. 75 Honduras 6-0 last night in Vancouver in its first match of the continental championship for North and Central America and the Caribbean. Canadian forward Tajon Buchanan scored a brace, which is soccerese for two goals.
Canada now heads to Houston to complete its Group B slate against 90th-ranked Curacao on Saturday night and 81st-ranked El Salvador on Tuesday. The top two teams in each group advance to the quarterfinals on June 28 and 29 in Glendale, Ariz., and Minneapolis.
If you missed yesterday's newsletter, here's our Gold Cup primer.
2. Canada's Marie-Philip Poulin was voted the top women's hockey player in the world.
The captain of the Canadian national team and the PWHL's Montreal Victoire received 33 per cent of the vote for the International Ice Hockey Federation's female player of the year award, the global governing body announced today. Poulin finished ahead of five Americans, led by goalie Gwyneth Philips of the PWHL's Ottawa Charge.
Poulin, 34, was named the MVP of the women's world championship in April even though Canada lost to the U.S. in the final. She had a tournament-high 12 points and also led the PWHL in goals this season with 19.
Philips made 17 saves in the United States' 4-3 overtime win over Canada in the world-title game after taking over for the Americans' injured starter in the third period. Despite Ottawa losing to Minnesota in the PWHL title series, Philips won playoff MVP after posting a 1.23 goals-against average and .952 save percentage in the post-season. Here's more on the IIHF award. | | | That's it for today. Talk to you later.
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