After walking out on Jets, Paul Maurice a win away from Stanley Cup

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You never want to count your chickens before they hatch, but only one team has successfully overturned a 3-0 series deficit in the Stanley Cup Final.

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The odds are stacked against the Edmonton Oilers emulating the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs against the Florida Panthers. Only four teams in the NHL’s 100-plus-year history have done it in the playoffs, never mind when the playoff bracket is reduced to two.

That means longtime Winnipeg Jets bench boss Paul Maurice is favoured to capture his first Stanley Cup in his 26-year NHL coaching career.

He’s been close before, with his Carolina Hurricanes losing in five games to the Detroit Red Wings in 2002 and then in same number last season as his Panthers succumbed to the Vegas Golden Knights.

Third time’s a charm.

Only two-and-a-half years ago, Maurice walked out on the Jets, resigning from the post he had held for parts of nine seasons after suggesting they needed a new voice.

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If you count interim coach Dave Lowry, Maurice’s replacement for the remaining months of that ugly season, the Jets will be on their third new voice this fall after Scott Arniel replaced the retiring Rick Bowness in May.

“They haven’t quit on me,” Maurice said at the time. “But they need somebody that can get them to that next place.”

Maybe Maurice just needed a different cast.

It didn’t take long for the 57-year-old to end up back on his feet, taking over the Panthers job from interim coach Andrew Brunette, who wasn’t retained after leading the Panthers to the Presidents’ Trophy in difficult circumstances in the wake of the Kyle Beach saga, which saw veteran coach Joel Quenneville fired.

Maurice felt he pushed the “rock pretty far up that mountain” in Winnipeg before leaving.

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He’s the only coach since the team returned in 2011 to lead the Jets past the first round, with a remarkable run to the Western Conference final in 2018 – the benchmark around these parts.

It’s true that Maurice walked into a promising situation in Florida, but he’s taken the Panthers to the next level with a style of play he always tried to implement in Winnipeg.

He’s received his fair share of criticism over the years, and he holds the NHL record for losses as a coach.

But no one is complaining about his lines or defensive pairings right now. And as early as Saturday night in Edmonton, he could be hoisting Lord Stanley’s mug.

Bobrovsky gives Jets hope

Conventional wisdom at the time Panthers starter Sergei Bobrovsky signed his seven-year, $70-million deal in Florida during the summer of 2019 was the team had a few years to win the Cup with him between the pipes.

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Save for an epic collapse, Bobrovsky is going to do what the 1996 Panthers came up short trying: bring the franchise its first mug.

The hardware won’t stop there, either, as he’s the frontrunner for the Conn Smythe in the fifth season of the contract.

‘Bob’ has had an incredible run.

He’s produced two of the most unbelievable saves in recent playoff memory: his improbable reaching-back glove save in the first round on Tampa’s Matt Dumba and his stretched-out, game-saving left pad stop in Game 3 on Thursday to deny Edmonton an equalizer late in the third period.

He produced a 32-save shutout against the Oilers in Game 1 and is riding a .956 save percentage in the Final – unbeatable numbers.

So why does this matter 2,000 kilometres north of the Sunshine State?

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Connor Hellebuyck’s seven-year extension kicks in next season, and conventional wisdom suggests that the Jets need to strike while the iron is hot, meaning they need to win before Father Time comes knocking.

Bobrovsky’s stellar play has suggested otherwise, however.

The deal was largely mocked at the time. Some figured it was one of the Panthers’ biggest mistakes.

And yet, five years into it and on the cusp of the Cup, no one’s laughing anymore.

It hasn’t been smooth sailing for the 35-year-old.

Bobrovsky backstopped five straight first-round eliminations in his first five appearances in the playoffs, with some performances that didn’t look dissimilar to Hellebuyck’s tough showing against Colorado this year. And only last season did Bobrovsky finally sniff past the second round.

This year is his 14th NHL season. He’s won the Vezina twice, as Hellebuyck will have when the NHL awards are handed out later this month.

Hellebuyck just finished his eighth full season as a starter, and has another seven ahead of him to engineer something different.

The good news for Jets fans is Bobrovsky is proving it’s possible.

sbilleck@postmedia.com

X: @scottbilleck

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