‘It’s devastating’: Oilers Game 7 loss is neither Cup nor bust

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It’s a bust if Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Zach Hyman and Mattias Ekholm were all watching this game from the couch or the cottage or the clubhouse.

It’s a bust if they’re gone in one round or two, again, so much promise and so little delivery. It’s a bust, maybe, if they lose to the Panthers in four straight, and wasn’t everybody willing to explore that gaudy little narrative after Game 3.

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But this Game 7 loss is neither Cup nor bust, and as such it is neither easier nor harder to swallow the bile that rises as the other team litters the ice with equipment at the buzzer, then cries and laughs and hugs and lifts the Stanley Cup.

“I mean, it’s devastating,” said Hyman. “You go through an entire year and another 25 games in the playoffs and you just battle through everything and you get the closest you can ever come really. You’re one goal away from sending it to overtime. Yeah, it’s heartbreaking. I’m really proud of everybody for getting to this point but it’s something that is always going to stick with you.”

It is the hardest trophy to win, and the Florida Panthers did it on Monday for the first time in their 30-year history, with a 2-1 victory over Edmonton. Sam Reinhart played the hero, scoring the game winner in the second period. It is no fun at all to lose, and the Oilers did that for the third time in their 44-year tenure in the National Hockey League. This defeat, like the Game 7 loss in Carolina in 2006, is another shot to the heart for the Oiler faithful. So close is still so far away from all the good things that happen when you win. The parade. The hugging. All of it.

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The glory gang of Oilers lost in 1983 too, when they were just fuzzy-cheeked stars in the making, and had virtually no idea what it took to win. A couple of them walked past the jubilant New York Islanders’ dressing room after being swept in four games and were surprised to see that most of the celebrating was being done by family members, because the ice bags attached to Islander body parts were inhibiting movement. The Isles’ veteran core had paid the price in strains and broken bones, the Oilers were unharmed and empty-handed.

These Oilers paid the price and still walked, or limped, away without the prize. Head coach Kris Knoblauch said Monday there will be a day to let everybody know who was playing with which injury, and you have to believe that Draisaitl was dealing with something, but this isn’t the time.

You do not complain about anything when you lose the way they did. You take it with class and maturity and the wisdom of years spent as pros. You swallow hard, give the Panthers their due, and try to keep your head up.

“You can analyze it to death if you want to. At the end of the night, if somebody beats you in a seven-game series, they’re the better team,” said Ekholm. “Good for them, but we were darn close and we’re going to be back next year.”

It will be Cup or bust again, though there is no chance they will all be back to try it, and little chance they will resurrect the slogan. That was the rallying cry this year, and they came as close as you can without actually busting out the celebration.

They built that belief around McDavid and Draisaitl and others at the core of a talented group, and the slogan evolved. Enough of the two-and-outs or three-and-outs. Enough losing to the eventual Cup winner, because that’s worth nothing more than a footnote. They have gone meekly into the night and deep into the playoffs in the past handful of years, and have nothing more than experience to show for it.

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But how many important lessons do you learn about your roster or your character or your willingness to pay the price when you are a single shot away from going to overtime in Game 7, after eight pre-season games, 82 regular season games and 24 previous playoff tilts?

How can that be a bust?

“It’s hard to look at it in black and white,” said Hyman. “You don’t make the playoffs, then you’re looking at the season like it’s a failure. We come a shot away from sending it to overtime. We battle back from 3-0. We battle back from 3-2 in Vancouver. We battle back from being near the basement in November, 10 points out of a playoff spot. So no, I don’t think it’s a failure.”

When the Oilers fired Jay Woodcroft and gambled on Knoblauch in November, they were 3-9-1 and coming off a devastating loss to the worst team in the league, the San Jose Sharks. They had rebounded to beat Seattle, but the die was cast. Knoblauch took the helm of a listing ship, they found their defensive game, and went on a glorious run that ended here, a shot short of the fairy tale.

“It’s obviously not where you want to be,” said Ekholm. “It’s one win away, it’s one period away, it’s one goal away. It’s just the details are so slim in this business. We had our chances in the third. Obviously they defended well. You just look at the big picture. What we’ve been through. The steps this group has taken. The maturity level, the compete that we put on in the playoffs especially.”

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Down 2-1 after 40 minutes on Monday, they had one more push for the final 20 minutes, and came close a couple of times. But the pucks that were bouncing in against Vancouver and Dallas, went wide or high or against a post on Monday.

“Pucks dancing on the goal line and scrambling and all that,” said Ekholm. “It just didn’t want to go in for us.”

dbarnes@postmedia.com

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