Paul Maurice, Panthers Pregame: Edmonton Oilers at Florida in 2024/25 Stanley Cup Final Rematch

Paul Maurice, Panthers Pregame: Edmonton Oilers at Florida in 2024/25 Stanley Cup Final Rematch

Well, how much more games for us? I I would say that we would feel this the same against any of the teams that we’ve played in the playoffs, right? There’s a history there and we’ve had a pretty good run and we do we get more wired up for Vegas games. It’s just both teams because they’ve played so much hockey and they’ve had so much success in the playoffs just to get to the final. You get to this time of year, you’re looking for some juice. like it’s it’s it is a different challenge for our teams, but we’ll bring it out in each other. So, we’ll probably very much like the energy and intensity both coaches will in this game. It kind of comes natural to them. It’s a challenge to find that when you’ve played as much hockey as both of these teams did. It’s not a lack of character. It’s hard. It’s a hard league. It’s hard to drive yourself every day to to get to that level, especially when you have that expectation, right? you have that kind of skewed perspective that every game should look like game six. It’s it’s not human. It’s not possible. So, but we’ll bring it out in each other tonight. I was having a conversation with Brad. You mentioned that after your team lost game, there was just this overwhelming confidence that game over the series. Is there anything that stands out to you about that that you remember? Well, I like hearing that because you probably feel better than I did. Uh, yeah. I mean, when you’re pretty sure what you’re going to do, when you’re very sure what you’re going to do, you worry about the result less. We kind of after we lost that game, we knew exactly how we were going to play, what we needed to do in game five. But even with that, this name may not be completely true, but one of the best well, one of the This is true. One of the best games that we ever played against Edmonton was game five in year one, and we lost that game, but that was our best five on five. You know, we were up three, we’re home now. It’s game five. We have all the energy in the world. We played an incredible game and lost it. They scored a five on three goal, five on four goal. uh gave up a tough one off a bad angle. And so that is the piece that will always grab a little piece of your confidence. You never be 100% confident because you can remember that game. We played as well as I thought we’ played the entire playoffs and lost. So that’s how good the other team is. You know, you can play your best and lose. And and I I the difference between winning and losing at the end is going to be perspective because you stand behind that bench and you can find places where you could you could have lost every game, right? Or won every game. It’s that close. Looking at both clinching wins, Bob only gave up one goal in each game. Two really good performance. When you look back at the total picture these last couple years, obviously so many guys have moments and legacies and stuff like that, but where does kind of Bob fit in the puzzle for you? How much do you think about Bob when you think about the Yeah, I I don’t mean to be disrespectful to anybody, but the Cons winner for me is the guy wearing pads holding the cup just plays in every game, right? The most important person. So to Conor McDavid and Sam Bennett, awesome. But I think that one’s a pretty easy sort. The guys wearing goalie pads holding the cup is the Cons winner. If you guys went in five and 24 probably, right? I don’t know. Like I don’t know. Maybe you get old, but my memor is not like like I I remember Sergey having I I guess what we would say is we would ask our goalender to win one game a series, right? That would that’d be all about the idea that if you’re going to get outplayed in a game and your goalender has to win you one game, at least pretty close to two in almost every one of the series that we played. And that’s so even if you have an off night or you get taken out of the net or whatever, just cuz it’s two months, put a lot of pressure on one goalie over two months, if you get to that two where you’re you’re you’re the best player on the ice for two of your wins, you’re you’re critical. Sergey, I’m trying not to be No, I’m trying not to exaggerate. I think I think what we do with Sergey Babroski, I think happens to Conor McDavid and Leon Dry. You’re so used to greatness, you you underestimate it. You become desensitized to how great they are because because you see it all the time. And then again, your perspective gets skewed and you expect it to happen every time a guy shoots the puck. How did he give that one up, right? can’t believe he got beat or can’t believe he didn’t go through all five guys to score. It’s just not real. That’s how good they are. One of the top of course the most impressive part in this game just the power of it, right? You don’t see men that strong with that fine of hands. You know, usually this the standard idea of power forward is more bull, not quite as much skill. Yeah, like the things that he can do with the puck, the angles that he scores from off off his weak side. Not I don’t know is there anybody else who does that in the league, but his power and then God he plays big man, plays a lot of minutes every night all playoffs like his endurance, his power, his strength, and then he has these incredible hands would be the thing I think I appreciate the most. scaven games in the league tonight. How much have you just enjoyed kind of how he’s got there? Obviously, he goes on the fourth line early, loves, learns, all the hard stuff, and now suddenly he’s a top six guy in the league, too. Yeah, I I enjoy that part the most. Right. Right from when you get some players out of college, it makes great financial sense for them to say, “I’ll sign with you, but you’ve got to put me in a game.” because that burns a year of their entry level contract which means they get to their first restricted free agent contract early which is it’s a really big said I’ll go wherever you want me to I’ll play wherever you want me to play so he went to Charlotte that’s such a good sign right like do the right thing and then he’s a skilled skilled fast player usually those guys come into teams and they’re kind of gifted top six maybe top nine maybe top six and they put up a lot of points and again financially that’s really good for It’s not necessarily caused the team to win anymore. He didn’t do that. Fourth line, fine. I’ll play wherever you want me to play. And he works his way to the third line. Right now, he’s playing with Marshy and Lundy and and he’s earned every single thing that he’s got. He plays hard. He competes. He doesn’t cheat the game. He’s involved in all that we do. If it’s a back check, he’s back. And if it’s a battle on the boards, he’s battling. He’s got some good hand skill. We think he’s just going to keep growing and get better. But I think Mackey will hit his prime much earlier than other young skilled players cuz they don’t figure it out till they’re 28 or 29 that you got to play hard on both sides of the puck. He’s got that figured out. It’s great for him but great for us. Do you see some I know it’s early. Do you see some similarities between Mackie and Jack? Similar as far as he didn’t want to burn the ELC. He took the This is his first year. He played three, four years in college. Yeah. A little more mature. Really really similar in their attitude toward doing the right thing and prepping themselves and preparing and be willing to be patient with their career. uh you you you do I mean we’re we’re not drafted in the top five so it’s a little bit different but you see a lot of these young players come in and they have a fairly high expectation of the opportunity they should be given and if they don’t get that they’re looking to go play somewhere else where they can and these guys are at the opposite end of the spectrum that wanted to play here they understand the players that are in front of them that want to do all the right things and learn the game the right way so they’re awesome to work with um and we think we got two really good players that are going to be good for a long time because it’s going to take them a little longer than people so people won’t notice because they’re not going to get top six minutes in power play time handed to them. So they got to take their time and earn that. By the time they’ve earned it, their whole game’s going to be rounded and then they’re going to become really important players for us. Sergey, please. Okay, guys. Yep. The other one.

Florida Panthers coach Paul Maurice meets the media before his team plays host to the Edmonton Oilers on Nov. 22, 2025.

The Panthers beat the Oilers in the 2024 and 2025 Stanley Cup Final.

Florida is coming off a 1-0 win over the New Jersey Devils: Sergei Bobrovsky made 31 saves for his 51st career shutout; Sam Reinhart scored the lone goal.

Defenseman Jeff Petry was celebrated for playing in his 1,000th NHL game on Monday; Jack Devine will make his NHL debut.

The Panthers Have Done It Again, Repeat as Cup Champs: https://floridahockeynow.com/florida-panthers-repeat-stanley-cup-champions-2025/

Panthers Get Their New Rings. Yeah, They Nice: https://floridahockeynow.com/stanley-cup-champion-florida-panthers-get-rings-yeah-they-nice/

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Video Courtesy Florida Panthers / Panther Vision