It has been a wild Stanley Cup Final , to say the least, and it all comes down to Game 7 on Monday night between the Florida Panthers and Edmonton Oilers.
Suffice it to say, it will be difficult for either team to lose — coming this far after a long season only to miss out on the Stanley Cup by one game. So, which team would a Game 7 loss be worse for?
According to an online poll posted to the "The Dan Patrick Show" social media, a resounding number of fans — just over 85 percent — think a loss on Monday night would be worse for the Panthers than it would be for the Oilers.
Why would losing out on the Stanley Cup be worse for Florida? While we can't say exactly why certain fans voted this way, we have a pretty good idea of why a loss would sting extra bad for Paul Maurice's team.
For starters, the Panthers — who were a betting favorite to win the Stanley Cup back in February — are getting a second chance at their franchise's first championship after they fell to the Vegas Golden Knights in last year's Stanley Cup Final.
There was a lot of talk ahead of the series that this Florida team wasn't "just happy to be here" like they were last year and were going to be more competitive. Now that the series has extended the full seven games, there's no doubt losing out on the Stanley Cup two years in a row would be rough.
A loss for Florida would also be worse given how this series has played out. The Panthers dominated the first three games of the series by playing the physical, smothering style of hockey that got them back to the Stanley Cup Final in the first place. Through the next three games, however, the offense has looked uninspired and the defense isn't doing much to help Sergei Bobrovsky out.
Florida went from outscoring Edmonton 11-4 in Games 1-3 to being outscored 18-5 in Games 4-6. There's no way to sugarcoat it: If the Panthers are dominated yet again on Monday, it will be embarrassing.
This isn't to say that losing in Game 7 wouldn't be devastating for the Oilers as well. Edmonton hasn't won a Stanley Cup since 1990. The last time it was even in the Stanley Cup Final was 2006 when it was defeated by the Carolina Hurricanes in seven games. That year was followed up by a decade of missing out on the playoffs completely.
It doesn't help, either, that Connor McDavid and the Oilers had a rough start to the regular season that included a coaching change and the threat of not making the playoffs at all. To say the Oilers are carrying a whole country on their shoulders isn't all that far-fetched.
All of that being said, it's easy to see why a loss in Monday's Game 7 would be worse for the Panthers than for the Oilers, given how the series has played out so far.
The puck drop for Game 7 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final is set for 8 p.m. ET on Monday.
