The Athletic Hockey Show - Ingram saves the Oilers season

Episode Date: April 29, 2026

The Oilers played their best game of the playoffs to stave off elimination. Sean, Frankie and Sean dissect a pivotal game 5 led by Connor Ingram and Vasily Podkolzin, they discuss the nasty OT winner by David Pasternak to spoil the party in Buffalo, and the Wild's impressive win over the Stars to take a 3-2 series lead, plus they look ahead to the three games tonight in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and pay tribute to John Garrett, one of the NHL’s all time great guys, gone too soon. Host: Sean Gentille and Sean McIndoeWith: Frankie CorradoExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff DometWatch full episodes on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@theathletichockeyshowJoin our Discord Server: https://discord.gg/VTm9VjkFSubscribe to The Athletic: https://theathletic.com/hockeyshow Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the athletic hockey show. What up? What up? It's the athletic hockey show for Wednesday, April 29th, 2026. I am Sean Gentilly. I am here with Sean McIndoo. We are speaking to you directly from our homes. Sean in the Ottawa area, me at the Edmonton Courtyard, the downtown courtyard. I think I've officially established residency here over the last couple of weeks. It's great to be with you, and Sean McIndoo, it's fine enough to be with you. Have you already planned out what you're going to be doing when you're back there for game seven? I just, I do appreciate to some extent the way the game went last night where at least I knew. At least I knew early what I was doing today.

At least I knew I was going to have to head back to, I almost said Edmonton. I'm going to head back to Anaheim this afternoon because, the Oilers made it a laugher relatively early. We'll talk about that. But we're going to, we're obviously, we'll start with that. We're going to go through the rest of the games. Set you up for tonight. Frankie Kriottos joining me later.

McIndoo has a split. So if you're a Frankie head, just fast forward, you know, 36 minutes or whatever. You can get to what you want there. In the meantime, Sean, we'll start with Edmonton because that was the, Edmonton, Inheim, because that's the only game I watched in its entirety last night, obviously. That was a tone-setting goal by Vasily Putt Goals in early in that one. They end up winning, oh gosh, what was the final there? 4-1-4-1. Good, good God.

What did you see on your end? There was certainly some stuff in the building that I want to talk about in a minute, but what were you thinking when you were watching that? It felt like it was like, okay, we can, we can sim to the end of this one. Yes. First period, it felt like. I mean, what I saw was not very much because you had Boston and Buffalo going into

overtime as the Oilers game was starting. And by the time that game was, not even by the time that game was done. It was 3-0 while the overtime was still going on. And I guess I will thank the Oilers. on behalf of all of us Eastern media types. Got to go, got to hit the hay early and do it guilt-free for a change. So, yeah, it was, you know, it was 2-0 and then you texted us, said it's 3-0. We sat and waited five minutes for the broadcast to catch up.

It was very delayed. And that was pretty much, I mean, it was. It wasn't game over period, end of story, because, you know, we saw it in the, in Vegas, Utah, we saw 3-0 lead blowing. And you're sitting there going, you know, the Oilers feel a little fragile right now if it's a bad goal or something. And it didn't really happen. They just, they had taken control of the game and they dragged it to the finish line with relative ease. And now the series feels very, very different than it did 24 hours ago. I was waiting for Podkoulzen to have a moment like that

where it was like you could tell postgame that most people who were writing Postgame were going to write about Vasily Podkoulzen. Like that was the kind of game he had in the full context of everything where, you know, it's kind of a dud elsewhere. But he also popped in a real way. He's been their best forward in this series,

I think, in a lot of different ways. He's got two goals, three assists. and he has generally looked like a guy who if you were an unaffiliated observer or a fan of another team who's tuning in and watching Oilers Ducks, you watch him out there, I would imagine, and you think, this is, man, okay, this is a guy I would like to have on my team. He's 24. He scored 19 goals in the regular season. He signed for a few more years for under $3 million.

That looks like a rare bit of good business. from Stan Bowman. And, dude, I, between McDavid and Bouchard and Chris Knoblock last night, it was like the Pod Coles in Love Fest. Everybody loves that dude. Knoblock said that people fight to have them on their line,

which is a wild thought. So I thought that was interesting, for a couple different reasons, is that we got to talk about something other than the obvious which, you know, Connor McDavid injury, Oilers choke in progress, blah, blah, blah. That was what we got for the last however many days. But also, like, Pod Colson was part of a win on Edmonton's end

that felt like they finally found the game that, you know, that they were looking for. Yeah, they got crushed down the stretch like in expected goals and shots. Part of that was because they were in a shell. it kind of worked because they were forcing pretty much everything from Anaheim to the perimeter. Like Ingram faced a lot of shots, but there weren't a ton of super dangerous ones outside, like a couple flurries like at the end of periods, right? So there was stuff to learn from that one, even though it was whatever done.

It was over before Bruin's Sabres in a lot of ways. And it's what a wild thing to say, right? to say he might be their best forward in this series. That's what you need if you're the Oilers, right? Not for him to be the best forward on a team with Connor McDavid and Leon Drysettle, but to have somebody that you can at least say that about. To have it not be McDavid, Drysidle, and then a massive cliff down to the next guy. and we've been waiting for that and we've seen it for chunks from Zach Hyman over the years.

Ryan Nugent Hopkins a couple years ago was that guy for pretty much a full season. No, maybe we've found our new piece, but that's what you need, especially when Connor McDavid is hobbling around and clearly not right. How much of that during the day there? Was there ever any real suspense on whether or something? Mac David was going to play because he didn't make it sound like it afterwards, but that's hockey players always say. Yeah. I think part of it was just that they're just limiting how much he skates. Like he didn't, he took a maintenance day on Saturday in Anaheim. Like they, like,

like, he's clearly dealing with something where they're like, okay, we're not even going to bother with this. It skates in practice days. Like, we don't want to, we don't want to risk tweaking it. So I wasn't. And then I think it just turns into a semantic game where he doesn't take a morning Skate. So yeah, sure, he's a game time decision. My take when Knoblock labeled him as such, you know, in the morning was that he was just like, yeah, whatever. He's

a game time decision. Even though everyone knew that born something wild, he would be in there. Because he hasn't looked, called an emergency meeting and changed the entire game plan. Oh, God. Oh, God. What are we going to do if McDavid doesn't play?

I I because you know he's been limited to some to some extent like he's clearly like the camera shots of him on the bench have been have been funny at times and you know he's not moving laterally all that well he's hitting his sixth year a little bit less frequently like he's obviously going through something but like he's only 10% faster yeah right he's he's he's only beating three guys on the russes on the russes he's only beating three guys on the rush, you know, to twice a game instead of five times, right? So, like, you know, he hasn't,

he's not 100% but also, like, I haven't, I hadn't in hat and don't look through it through the lens of like, oh, God, like, like, like what if he doesn't play? I think the reason it was interesting, and the reason we had to like at least kind of prepare, you know, some kind of contingency plan if he didn't,

was that if he didn't, if he didn't play in that game, after looking relatively, like, you know, well enough to play, A, and B, it's, it's an elimination game at home. That would have set off, like, any alarm bell that was available in the, in the province of Alberta, right? Like, like, people would have lost their marbles because it would have said something, or it would have been reasonable to read into that decision. But, like, you know, he makes it irrelevant and comes out and looks fine at warmups. And it was just like, you know, whatever. He sounded, he like, sincerely, I believed him at a post game and he was like, I was, I was always going to play.

Like, I bought what he was, what he was selling there. It would be nice to get him healthy if you're the Oilers. It's an understatement. And that is, that is the top, because, I mean, looking ahead, right, this is going to be a seven-game series. If the Oilers, if the Oilers win it, there's no rest. So now that it's guaranteed to go seven And then the Oilers are going to win

And you're just going to stay in Edmonton For the Utah series Where are we out on that? Because I mean I have I've said this before I have this thing that happens to me in the playoffs Where if you talk to me about any series Whoever won the last game I'm convinced is winning the series

Yeah I just my brain cannot I know I've, look, I've read my Bill Barnwell. I know momentum isn't really a thing in the sense that we always talk about it. But my hockey playoff rate doesn't know that. And so I'm looking at this series now, just as, you know, a day ago, the orders were done. Are you kidding?

Yep. So, and now I'm looking at this going, you know what? You had a nice run, Anaheim. You took the conference champs as far as he could go. Now it's done. Edmonton's winning this series in seven. Talk me out of that. Give me the Anaheim perspective of why this wasn't,

you had your chance to land the knockout punch and you didn't do it. I think it's a situation where I think they learned, you say we learned a lesson about the pace of closeout games, or potential closeout games, right? that when you have a team that's back against the wall and all that BS, all those cliches we've heard, but they react differently. And I think,

I think Anaheim got a little bit of a taste of that before. And also, like, I know I said that a lot of perimeter shots, you know, the oilers cleaned up what they were doing at the net front at least and helped Ingram, you know, see pucks maybe more than he had in the past.

And that, that helped. but I think if you're the ducks, you look at the way things went in the second, third period, and you say, like, listen, man,

we had, we had, you know, nine bad minutes to start the game, and then we fed it to them for, for, for 50. I don't know that that's completely true,

but, like, it's close enough where if you're Anaheim, you can, you can say that. Like, there was a stop that it. Tell yourself. Yeah,

100%. There was a stop, too, that Ingram made on Leo Carlson, like, late in the first period. that, you know, unbelievable speed burst from Carlson, like, down into the low slot and Ingram handled it. That was, in that moment, you saw the narrative, like, that split second when the puck's on Carlson stick, you're like, he's going to score here.

They're going to go in it, they're going to go intermission with a 3-1 deficit instead of 3-0. and then the prime's going to be pumped for another oilers meltdown after them blowing all these leads over the course of the series. You could kind of see that crystallize. And I think they generally played well in the second two period. So yeah, if you're the ducks and you're, yeah, Joel Quimble, by the way, it was not happy after the game. He was, he was particularly sour with the way things went. So I don't know that that's necessarily, you know, the message he's bringing into the room where he's like, yeah, you guys, you guys felt like, like, I played fine in second and third period.

I doubt that's what he was saying. But if you wanted to hang your hat on something like that, you probably could. But, yeah, I'm resigned to the fact that I'm going to continue flying between Edmonton and Anaheim, whatever, twice, twice more. What's the theme park situation in Edmonton? there's um esotikinen lands okay great

i got a i got a parkhopper pass between between that and fernando pizanaville cool excellent all right it's gonna be a big day when i'm back here on march second or whatever whatever it is

all right let's boston buffalo that's a game i unfortunately didn't see a second off because i had I had worked stuff to deal with. I was, I'm told that David Pazernock scored a, a nice one at 9-14 of overtime. I, Hampas Lindelpsons Springs.

There was some cool line-chained stuff that happened there on Boston's end to settle that up that Fluto wrote about very, very well today. Of course, that one, 3-2, headed back to Boston. Sean McIndoo, is this a write-off game for the Sabres? because I'm starting to get concerned. Yeah, well, I mean, again, my bias towards the last team to have won kicks in. Because, you know, watching that game last night, first of all, if you didn't see it, or if you're down in the States and it probably wasn't a big deal,

there's this great moment before the game where the Buffalo Anthem Singer, her mic cuts out I guess she must have borrowed the same mic that the referees use because it's cutting in and out and in Buffalo if people don't know they always do the Canadian anthem even if there's not a Canadian team because they're right up against the border they got a lot of Canadian fans come down

and it's just sort of a gesture they've always done and so the mic cuts out and the Buffalo crowd starts singing the Canadian anthem they know the words they pick her up and we get this this moment of all of these American fans of an American team singing the Canadian anthem. And as if the Sabres weren't already everyone's favorite team, the entire country of Canada went.

Okay, that's it. That's our guy. Because every year at this time up here in Canada, especially during the cup drought years, we have to have this stupid debate about who's Canada's team and are we all cheering for the haves now? And it's never, we might actually have a Canada's team. for once. And it's the Buffalo Sabres. And so you're sitting there going, man, this is great. I'm now sitting there thinking, if the Sabres go O for 3 and blow this series after their fans

sang the Canadian anthem, I'm going to think there might be something to this whole, this whole Canada crew. They truly are Canada's team. That will be the turning point. So we got two rounds to, like two rounds in this series of people realizing that they sing the Canadian Anthem in Buffalo. Like it happened earlier. Like I saw I saw that circulate you know because whatever. Sabres back in the playoffs. People would never seen a Sabres game. That's exactly.

I was like not annoyed by it, but I was like, didn't we already do this? Like I thought I thought everybody who is, you know, who paid attention to hockey was at least vaguely aware of it. Clearly it clearly was wrong. And the reason for that is that nobody has paid attention to the Sabres for 14 years or whatever it is. So people are learning all this stuff fresh. That was a nice change of pace to see. And I'll tell you this, because the game itself, regulation, it was fine. It was, you know, one-one, it's a close game, close, meaningful hockey is always entertaining to some degree, but it wasn't.

And certainly after the two games in Boston that weren't super close, it was nice to see on some level, but not the greatest. then you get to overtime. And this is where, again, like, if, if we're going to make Buffalo into Canada's team, we should have let you guys know, don't let Dave or Pastor not go in alone on your goal. In overtime of an elimination game. I could have told you that. I'm sorry. My bad.

I kind of assume Lindy Ruff maybe would have had that up on the board. But, yeah, those are the two moments that we're going to remember from overtime is Jeremy Swamen, absolutely pulling off a robbery to lead to David Pasternak having that chance. And I mean, I know it's a cliche to say that sometimes you see a guy going in alone with the puck on a stick and you go, oh, this one's over. And then if it's not, you forget about it and you move on. You kind of had that feeling. This guy's not going to be.

And he goes in, he scores, he bounces off the boards, talks a little trash to some fans about, you know, we'll be back here. That's fun, man. It's some life from the Bruins. And, I mean, look, they've, the Bruins have looked good in this series in Buffalo. It's been a weird series that way. The Sabres' two best games have come in Boston. And obviously, that's where we're headed for Game 6. So, you know, in that sense, it's maybe good news if you're saying.

Sabres fan, but you can at least see this one going sad. Because I mean, boy, that, that crowd was ready to pop. They were waiting for the, the Mayday moment for a new generation. And then David Pasternak put an end to it. Tage Thompson hasn't scored since game one. Interesting. Interesting fact for, I, I'm trying, I'm trying not to, you know, be a Sabres alarm.

missed here, but because those games like that happen, man. It's like this, it's the playoff equivalent of like a schedule loss where you're just like can't win them all. What are you going to do? But I don't know, man. That one feels like it's going seven. That's big stuff from Swainman too after he freaks out on those dudes in the last game. Like he put his money where his mouth was on that. Well, that's, that is it, right? I mean, he he had his, his moment, you know, the down the bench. I don't hate seeing that for a goalie.

I don't mind seeing a little part. I'd certainly rather see that than him with his head down, just the sulking down the tunnel kind of deal. But then you got to back it up. Yep. He did. He did as well as you could. And I'm with you. I kind of now feel like this is going seven and check back with me after game six.

But I don't feel like it's panic time for the Sabres if this goes seven. I still feel like you're in good shape coming home. But certainly if you're the Bruins, you're going, guys, we can play with these guys. You could argue, I mean, last night it was a real close game, but they got the win. You could argue the Bruins have been the better team three out of the five games. Yeah. And you say, we're going to home ice. We haven't played our best game at home.

We're going to go get the fans into it. And we're going to come back here for game seven, and we can win here. We know that. Totally. You feel okay if you're the Bruins. It's fair. Last, the final game, like, well, not the final game, but the game last night that we haven't talked about. Minnesota, Dallas, it's the wild winning 4-2 in that one, more 5-on-5 dominance from them in that.

They've outscored Dallas 14 to 4 to even strengthen the series in 11-3 at 5-on-5. They got no five-on-five goals, the stars, in the past 207 minutes and 53 seconds. That is a bad, bad sign. And it seemed like I watched the condensed game on that one this morning. I know there was an empty netter at the end, so I don't want to make it sound like it was a total laffer. But, geez, a 4-2 playoff win that needs an empty netter to salt one away at the end of it, I think that was a – it didn't seem like it felt that close in the run of play.

It was a close game. You know, Minnesota didn't take the lead until basically the end of the second period. Yeah. Then they get the insurance goal, and then Jason Robertson again gets on the board to make it close. Not a... I guess I'd say it felt like Minnesota was in control of that game for very long stretches. And yeah, the five of the five. on five thing has emerged as

the theme of this series. And I hate credit to the wild, they called their shot on it. Right? You know, Marcus Filino saying they can't hang with us five on five. And, I mean, it's bad enough. You know, we always say, right? Most of the, the reason that whenever we're looking at stats and all this stuff, we always focus on five and five,

because that's what most of the game has played. And that's true in the regular season, in November. it's true in the playoffs in game one, it's definitely true in the playoffs in game six and seven because that's when the whistles go away. And look, we know, I'm not bashing referees here,

because they've got a tough job, but we know the deal by now. We know referees manage these games from the start. And especially if you're sitting there going, you know, am I going to make a borderline call, hey, if one of these teams can only score on the power play, that makes me even more reluctant to give them any sort of a coin flip call. It's tough.

You know, the Dallas Stars might only get one or two power plays in game six, and they might only get one in game seven if there is one. They're in trouble. It's tough math. You know, this series so far, it's not over, obviously. but this has gone about as well as the wild could have hoped for. This is, if you drew up the realistic scenarios, obviously every team wants to sweep and, you know, have an easy time of it.

But you look at how good Dallas is, and you're Minnesota and you're the road team in a series against them, this has played out about as well as it possibly could have. Yeah, and then Dallas, too, It's a... I don't want to dump on Tyler Myers necessarily because there's plenty of guys in that lineup. Jason Robertson's been great.

Miko Renton and, you know, he's doing everything on the power play, not much at even strength. So, like, the stars aren't producing. The bottom six obviously isn't. Like, there's a whole lot of stuff that's gone wrong for Dallas here. Tyler Myers had to play on the second pair last night.

That's not a great sign. He's there. because Niels Lundquist has a pretty gnarly cut on his face. The end result is that you end up pushing up Tyler Myers to a second pair. This is predictable in a sense because we've seen it bite Dallas so many times in the past where they can't figure out the right side of their defense in a permanent way. Like Chris Tanev obviously was a big deal there. He doesn't play there anymore.

And other than him, it's been a revolving door of guys who just haven't been the answer in one way or another. And it felt like Tyler Myers was going to be the latest in that line. And it kind of showed last night just a brutal turnover to lead to Minnesota's first goal. It takes a bad penalty. It just generally looked like a guy who was overmatched in that role. And that's a bad sign, man. because we've seen this year over year, you know, you, like, everyone loves picking the stars, but also they kind of keep losing for the same reasons.

And not being able to figure out that particular spot on the ice is, is it, is a big one, man. He was their big deadline ad, and it ain't working out. And it felt like the wild were, we're going after him, like trying to exploit that, that spot. And it's tough. And, yeah, that, that is a concern for Dallas. and then the other one, which is either a concern or maybe not, depending on how you want to spin it, is Miko Rantonan has not been a big factor in this series. He's got one goal.

He's got six points. So, I mean, that's, you know, we don't want to overstate it. But only the one goal. And the reason I say maybe, you know, how you view that is up to you. I feel like we had this conversation about three or four games into the first round last year about Miko Randon and how it hadn't paid off and, you know, all this stuff. And then I'm trying to remember what then. Oh, right. He went absolutely supernova in the second half of that series against Colorado to an extent that we had never seen.

I mean, I remember, you know, saying like literally, this is one of the great playoff performances ever. in the ultra short term. Now, I don't think you're expecting that again. I don't think you're sitting there going, go out there and have a four-goal period or whatever it is. But it does feel like the Miko-Rantin factor is kind of the ticking time bomb over this series. Because right now, Jason Robertson is carrying the offense on this team. He's making himself a lot of money to the process,

but they can figure that out down the road. You want Miko Ranting to step up and we haven't had a Miko Ranting game yet. I'm not sure we've had too many Miko Ranting periods or shifts. We need a few of those if we're going to have this series that we all had locked in for seven games if it's going to go seven. Because now you got Minnesota going back, little momentum, home ice, all of this. you feel cautiously pretty good, I think, if you're a wild fan. Are we at the end of the series, are we still talking about Michael McCarron having more goals than Miko Wren?

And I tend to think not. Glenn Gallatin should just go out and tell him to score four goals in a period, but before game six. I don't think we're talking about it, but McCarrant's been good. And I saw, you know, I saw Rousseau spiking the football on all the critics who didn't love that deadline pickup. It's been a good piece. It's April.

I'm not not quite, not ready just yet. We'll see. All right, but I know you, I know you got to go. So you split. We'll bring in,

we'll bring in Frankie to take her home. Do you, did you have anything you wanted to say about, about John Garrett? I know he's a, I know he's a, just a great, great dude,

a staple for Canadian hockey viewers over the last however many years. He obviously died unexpectedly the night before last and it's um it's it's sad to see really shocking news to to wake up to yesterday uh i didn't i didn't know him personally uh but i knew a lot of people who did and they just some of the stories and some of the i just overwhelmingly uh positive stuff just a guy who had a fantastic impact and

and I knew him as a viewer sitting back watching watching the Canucks or watching the late national games and you know just that that great personality that you sometimes don't get from the ex

players but it's a can always count on the goalies to to bring it a little bit and yeah just from all accounts a great guy and I know it's a lot of fans, viewers are heard, especially out of Vancouver, which is his home base, and just all the best to them and to his friends and family and a thank you to him for making hockey viewership up here in Canada so much better

and so much more fun over the decades. It's well said. We're going to hit a break and come back with Frankie. All right, we're back. It's a big trade up. TGB's gone. Frankie's in. He's wearing a suit.

I'm wearing a dirty white t-shirt. You're making me look bad. You're making me feel bad. What's up? What's up, buddy? Hey, I know the last time that shirt was washed was, who knows when, man. I get it, though. I have been on the road.

I get it, man. It's just good for you for, carrying that microphone around and schlep and everything, I know it's a grind. Yeah, I, we talked, we talked about this before we started recording, but I will say it again. This microphone, I'm pretty sure it looks like a gun on TSA scanners because they, I get, I'm getting auxiliary searched every single time, even with pre-check, man. That's a, it's a disaster. It's tough out there.

And I travel with the microphone, laptop, printer. So I am constantly having, like, the printer's insane work. Oh, it's crazy stuff. It's crazy stuff. What's going on, buddy? It's been a while. I know, man.

It's been, it's been too long. It's been some combination of me and Boltman and Mac and Dew, and I'm just, I'm not, I'm not psyched about it. It's not fun. Let's talk about Pittsburgh, Philly, shall we? This is a game we're getting a night. I haven't watched let's say 15 minutes of it

Like all these games I was complaining about the smack into Every other game is they're taking place Like while I'm like while I'm at the rink For for Oilers Ducks or in an airplane So I've watched I've watched minimal Moments here What have what's your takeaway, Ben on like what's your vibe check

On on Pittsburgh Philly heading into game six tonight Okay, you want my vibe check? This is it. This is maybe a bad example, but you'll see where I'm going with this thing. Remember when Tiger was at his best, and if he wasn't in the lead on Sunday, you could hear and you could feel the footsteps coming of Tiger. And it was like, here he comes. He's charging up the leaderboard. And right now, the Philadelphia Flyers would be getting that feeling, but the footsteps are number 87.

And it's like, here comes Crosby. And it's got that same aura because it's a legend and one of the greatest to ever do it. And that's what you would be feeling. The pressure of, uh-oh, it's Crosby time. And really what kind of has happened in this series is Philly had played their game plan to a T. But let's call a spade a spade, man. They were getting a lot of help from Pittsburgh making unforced errors, casual plays, defensive zone missed coverages.

It was sloppy and it was quite honestly, like there was some soft stuff going on. Yeah. And now Pittsburgh's not doing that as much anymore. They're hardly doing it. And as much as Phillies, this really good defensive team, they don't generate a ton. And if you don't make the mistakes and you don't open the door for them, that becomes more difficult. And now we're seeing the games flow in the way that Pittsburgh wants them to flow, where

there's pace and there's, you know, some puck execution and there's some up and down the ice, that doesn't favor Philadelphia. That favors Pittsburgh and it favors 87, Al-A Tiger Woods, charging up the leaderboard on a Sunday. Yeah, it seems like the pace has been there. It does seem like it's a game that's closer to the one that Pittsburgh wants to play, the production isn't quite there for them, which I feel like that's almost, that is almost a good sign, though, because like this is a team that scored the third most goals in the NHL in the regular season.

They're obviously not producing at that level so far in this one. But like it feels like it feels like it's not difficult to see a world where Pittsburgh, you know, wins this five to two tonight or something. Like it seems like that's a, I'm not, that's not a prediction, but I think it's much more in play now than it was a few days ago. I totally agree. And I've said this on a couple other shows now and I would love to get your take on it. but there is some kind of like alternate universe where Stuart Skinner gets pulled from the Edmonton Oilers Net and in comes Arters Sheloves.

Meanwhile, dude, I was, I was, I was, I put that in the notes for today because last night, there were, really over the course the last few days because she loves has stopped 46 of the last, of the 50 shots he's faces here at play Skinner. There have been people around in Edmonton, media people, other people. people who are like, she loves, man. Like, like, could have had them. Like, that's like, that is absolutely part of the narrative here. And what would you have had to give up?

Like, you wouldn't have to chase a Tristanjari contract and be tied to that now. Nope. Like, we're, we're getting off topic bringing in the oilers, but I just can't help to think that, like, think about how this series has changed. Not just because she loves is in the net. And I don't, you know, fault Stuart Skinner entirely for them being. down three nothing. He was really, he was really good in game one. If, if nothing else. 100%. And Skinner has played well in the past. I think back to last year against Dallas and

Vegas. But I mean, I just, you just can't help but think about it. Now Sheelovs has played great. And that kind of put the team in my view anyways on notice that like you guys aren't helping out your goaltender. So help out this guy. And now we're seeing the results for for the pens is like Philly has a hard enough time scoring as it is. You add in the pressure and the urgency of having to do it now. I think that gets you thinking a little bit if you're Philly. This series feels like it could be primed to go the distance. Yeah.

Utah Vegas tied it two. They go to the night as well. I saw a decent chunk of that one a couple days ago. This feels like maybe our best bet for like a chaos goalie series. Like Carter Hart, you know, fell apart in that one, even though Vegas ended up getting the win. But Melko was also terrible. He'd been fairly strong before that. That's kind of the thing I'm watching in this one is, like, the possibility that this game turns into two guys who, you know, who can't stop a puck.

I'm interested to see if that's the way it goes down. It's so strange for me because there's been goaltending issues in Vegas all season long, clearly. Vamelka's numbers have typically been good this year, and Utah has improved a lot defensively this year. Like, that was the thing about Utah last season that maybe held them back a little bit is as fun and exciting as they were offensively. They gave up those ones. It almost kind of reminded me a little bit like Anaheim, where they would trade them. And now, like, they're a better team in that, in that aspect. but we're kind of seeing like Vegas maybe uncharacteristically when we think of Vegas.

Like every team just has a certain reputation. Their reputation for a long time was really buttoned up. And like Utah is kind of pushing that. Like they're they're kind of forcing them to or forcing us to realize that, listen, Vegas might not be all that buttoned up. And, you know, Mitch Marner might not be the answer to all your problems at this point. Like there's there's a few things that play there, but we, you know, not that we, I think we talked about Utah and a lot of people would have said that they're a team that should be in the playoffs and they're going to get in the playoffs. But this might be a little bit of a coming out party for Utah that may be putting everyone on notice that they're better than what we may have expected from them.

Now, going back to last game, I thought that game was over. Like when when when when when the lead changes like that, it's hard to get that back. So it's four three. It's four three. It felt like it was seven three. You know what I mean? Exactly. I dug out of it is just was just I couldn't believe what I was watching.

A hundred percent. And ultimately Vegas wins that battle of attrition. But it feels like that battle is different than the some of some of the physical warlike battles that we're seeing maybe for instance in a series like the Montreal Tampa series. Yeah, man. That's one I've been lucky enough to catch a decent chunk of. What's, what's the crowd of vibe check on that heading into, heading into game? Obviously, they're tied it to as well. That's like, that's the, that's the marquee series this round for me still, even though so many of these have tightened up over the last few days. As far as I'm concerned, this is the best series going. It's the most captivating. It has a little bit of everything that you

would want like big performances, Hegel, you know, like back and forth play really close, special teams, goalies, bad calls, like maybe turning points. So I kind of look at this series and you talk about momentum. And in game two, Montreal plays a good 40 minutes. And then Slavkovsky has a brutal turnover leads to a Kuturov goal. And then Kirby Doc has a bad icing and he misses his coverage off the face-off leads to the Moser game winner. And then you're like, wow, Tampa, all the momentum. Is that the defining moment of the series? But they go back to the Bell Center.

Montreal plays well, game three, they win. Another close game. They've all been close. Then game four, Montreal's playing well for 40 minutes. There's the hit on Slavkovsky. There's the goal in the last minute of that second period. And Tampa dominates in the third. and they end up winning that game.

And you're like, okay, Montreal just showed that they didn't let game two's third period meltdown be a defining moment. Can they now show that game four's third period is not going to be a defining moment? The only difference is now you're going to Tampa. You don't get the comfort of going back on home ice. And the big thing, the big line for Montreal, goose egg at five on five. Yeah, man. Zero points at five on five. You cannot win a series that way.

It's just not possible. So five, five of the six, five on five goals have essentially come from like the bottom six in Montreal. You know how many like outside of the top six Tampa has scored? It's like one. That sounds right. It's all Hegel. It's Kucheroff. It's Gensel.

And there's the one Moser goal. Bottom line is this, man. You're not good enough to beat Tampa Bay with your bottom six. You're just not. Your top guys have to find a way. So that has to start tonight for Montreal, non-negotiable. The top line has to find a way. Brandon Hagle having a con shortlist series here.

Like if it's a month from now and we're talking about, you know, like Tampa getting this done, man, like people are going to fall back on this one. People are going to remember it because he's the best player on the ice more often than not. It's wild. Think about Hagle and how he's wired and how the rest of that team is wired. Right. Like Tampa gets a lot of credit around the league. for being like Florida before Florida

in your face, gritty scrums, all that kind of stuff. But when I look at the top guys for Tampa, I see Kuturov, doesn't show a ton of emotion, but it'll have some greasy plays. Gensel, Sorrelli, Point, like they're not boisterous.

Those are pretty even keel dudes. Pretty even keel guys. Heagel's the opposite. He is in your face. He's constantly moving. He's calculated. He picks on Slavkovsky, essentially guilts him into fighting him, right?

Like that's one of these things now where, like, if you're Slavkovsky, you're like, I'll give you the fight because I want to show my teammates that I'm ready to step up and do more. But if you're Hegel, you're like, I got a really good player. Got him on the hook. Got him on the hook, baby. Let's go. And that's two things now where they've got Slavkovsky. They got him on the fight and they got him on that hit.

I wonder if that's something that continues. But, man, Hegel's been, he's been dynamite. He has been everything you could hope he would be and more. And they haven't really had the answer for that. And I wonder, like, if you, you're Montreal and you really focus in on Hagel, is Kuturov primed for a four point night? Oh my God. That's, that's it, man. And that's such, that is the way Kutrave operates, man.

We've seen it so many times over the years where it's like, you know, maybe it goes a game or two. And then it's then the outburst happens, right? Like that's, that has to be the fear is that, is that he's got four sounds, four sounds like the right number. It feels like he's got one of those in his bag, man. That's the thing. You budget, okay, every playoff series you budget for certain things to happen, right? You're like, okay, there's going to be pasta is going to have an overtime winner at some point. Like, you just know there's going to be these, these defining things that happen.

The Kucharov four point night where he's an absolute star and you can't do anything. about it. It's in the budget for the series. And it just depends. Is it going to happen tonight? Is it going to happen? I don't know. Like in game six or seven, if it gets to seven, it's, it's interesting. But I wonder if Tampa Bay looks at it the other way and says, how much longer can we keep Caulfield not scoring a five on five? Because as Coughfield scored 51 this year, it was, what, 11 on the power play? Ten or it wasn't it wasn't like he was a power play merchant, man. He was a five on five goal score and zero empty net. The single biggest thing about him, you know, this, this year is that is his,

just jacked up the five on five production. Like I think people had an idea of the kind of player he was going to be a couple years ago. Like if you would, if you'd have forced people to say like, predict how things turn out for Cole Coffield, I was going to be like, well, he's definitely going to be a power play weapon, probably going to give away a lot and it's in his own end and blah, blah. And that's in a lot of ways, man, he's out kicked. that in a big, big way.

So he's, he's not that. And, you know, credit to Montreal, because they've kind of kept up and sometimes initiated a lot of the physicality in this series. So it's not like they're, it's not that like they're lagging behind in that regard, but it's the timing of some of the ways Tampa has done it that has led to them gaining different moments of momentum. I think this is, I totally agree with you. This has been the best series by far.

It's the most captivating and it's got just a little bit of everything. and I hope it goes the distance because it kind of both teams are, like both teams are deserving of having like that one game to really show what it's all all about. Will the United In-Flight Wi-Fi hold up well enough for me to watch that on the way to John Wayne Airport? We're going to figure out tonight, baby. We're going to come back here for segment three,

me and Frank are going to tell you what we learned. All right, we're back. Frank Crato, here is something I have learned. What have we learned, Sean? When I was doing some amount of research at the rank last night, me and CJ were batting this around. We've figured out in one way or another, this sounded fake. Connor McDavid has been a point-per-game player in every playoff series he's played in his career except one. And it was the first one of his career against San Jose in 2016.

That's incredible, A. B, he is what I think he clinched it last night or certainly came close to it, regardless of what happens in this series against the ducks. But that's one of those things. That's one of those stats you hear. And it sounds impressive, but you're also like, it needs context, right? You're like, that sounds wild, but is this something you see from other great players? It's not. No, it's not.

It's actually very rare. It isn't. At this point, at this point, he's played 101 playoff games. When Sidney Crosby had played 101 playoff games, he had gone five series under a point per game, five versus one. And in his entire career, he's gone 12, 12 separate series under a point per game. And that's not meant as a knock on Sidney Crosby. that is context for how remarkable it's been, you know,

how remarkable the consistency in the production has been for McDavid. Listen, he takes, he took heat deservedly so in 2024 against Florida, right? Because he wasn't producing in game six or game seven. That sticks for some reason. But overall, in terms of body of work, 101 career playoff games, Like this is this is wild wild wild stuff. It's, uh, and who would have thought that if you just tease the fact that he might not play in the morning, that at night you will catch the other team sleeping, especially the other

team's goalie and you will get off to a three nothing lead and never look back in that game. Like I can't help but wonder the gamesmanship that was out at play there because you would think. We talked, we talked about it in the, in the, in the first. I want to hear your take on this. Well, you would think that if you're Anaheim, you're like, you smell the blood in the water, man, and you're all over it. No, McDavid, let's finish this thing off tonight. Instead, it was like Edmonton came out and said, you want us to be buttoned up defensively? No.

Yep. You want our goalie to play great? No, again, guess what we're going to do? We'll snap this puck around and you won't touch it for 10 minutes. And that's how we're going to beat you. Can they do it for, you know, for the rest of the series and find a way to wait a way. I guess we'll see. They're going to have to button it up at some point because you're not going to keep Anaheim from scoring that long. But that was that was crazy and that's kind of the oiler way. I'll tell you what I learned. And this is just a generic thing. But maybe people like wouldn't know because I found this fascinating. In the 459 previous times, a team has been up three, two in a playoff series. They've gone on to win that series 365 times. That's 79.

0.5% of the time if you're up 3-2. So, like, we got some big games tonight for sure, but we also got, like, some history suggesting that if you are winning game five, you are going to win the series. And so that, that I, as a player, you'll try not to think about that because it's not process driven, but like for us as media and for fans, like, it is so. so pivotal. 80%'s a lot. That's a lot. That's not 65. That's not 58. That is 80%. And that is history telling you that if you win game 5, you are likely winning this series. So yeah, I think that's something that if you're watching the games tonight, you will keep in mind. And either good or bad, however your team does. Very quickly, rank the games tonight in

terms of your interest in them. Pittsburgh, Philly, Utah, Vegas, Montreal, Tampa Bay. Montreal, Tampa Bay, Pittsburgh, Philly, Utah, Vegas. Don't come at me with an East Coast bias, but I'm sorry. They will. It is the best series with Montreal and Tampa Bay. Sidney Crosby, who we've been yelling and screaming about, needing to see him in the playoffs, and he's charging up the leaderboard and Vegas, Utah.

So that's why that's my three pack for you. We love it, buddy. What's your schedule like for the rest of the week? week. You're doing you're doing U-18 stuff. You're all over the place. That's what the suits for. It's not for me. I know that. No, it's not for you. I wouldn't dress up for you. You know that. I was doing, I wouldn't dress up for many people, to be honest with you. Yeah, I just did U-18 panel. Canada lost in the quarterfinals to Sweden, so they're out. And then we have our HABs post-game reaction stuff tonight. And then I'll stick around, do some sports center. And then back at it, basically, every single day on Canada's sports leader. I love it, man. Try to squeeze you in next week, too. Let's see if we can make this work when I'm probably back in Edmonton.

I don't know. Oh, my God. You'll be parts unknown, Gentilly. All I do know is that if you are back in Edmonton, you need to go to the West Edmonton Mall on hop on that roller coaster, baby, because we need more pictures of you at amusement parks. Solo, like, lone man goes to amusement parks. on work time. Yeah, we need

some more of that, baby. Disneyland is not my future on this on this, on this, on this, on this, on this, on this, on this, on this, you need the West Edgson Mall. Let's go. Go to Marine Land or whatever's, whatever's over there. I've been there once. Depressing place. All right, buddy, enjoy the games. Talk to you next week. Thank you folks for listening.

Shane and Max have the show tomorrow. Me and Haley are both in transit. So you get an upgrade in the form of those two. So congratulations. Again, enjoy the games tonight. Like to you again real soon.