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00:00South Florida could be the place to be for yet another championship.
00:03Now, the game isn't tonight.
00:04It will be tomorrow night, which is Tuesday.
00:07But understand this.
00:08Like, I don't have to be a big hockey guy to understand the ebbs and flows of a series and what makes sense.
00:13So, looking forward to the last game they played, which was a 2-2 series tie,
00:18what a pivotal game back in Edmonton after a collapse from Florida.
00:22But you know what, Joe?
00:23I love Florida.
00:24Not because of the fact that they're a good hockey club.
00:26Yeah, we understand that.
00:27They're in the Stanley Cup Finals and won a championship last year.
00:29But understand this.
00:30Whenever you have one side, like Sergei Bobrovsky, we're not talking about, hey, we're going to pull that goalie.
00:35He's really struggling.
00:36There's really a head game here.
00:38The fact that you saw Edmonton just coming to you, oh, who are we going to start as a goalie,
00:41immediately forced me to bet the Panthers, and I love them.
00:44And they go right out and take that early lead in that game, 2-0, get the 3-0 lead, and never look back.
00:50Talk to me about Edmonton in a Stanley Cup Final where you don't even know who your goalie is.
00:55Come on now.
00:55You can't bet that side, can you?
00:57Listen, two reasons why I loved Florida heading into the Stanley Cup.
01:04One of them was goaltending, and the other was coaching.
01:08If Paul Maurice in a million years would never have done what Knobloch did there.
01:15Listen, Picard is a backup, and he's a backup for a reason.
01:19You bring the backup in, Donnie, just like you did in order to spark a team in order to be able to come back and win, and they did that.
01:28What you don't do is create a controversy and panic by starting the backup goalie in an all-important game five.
01:37The minute he died, I'm with you.
01:38I'm like, what are we – now you're going to go back to Skinner on the road where you had to pull him last game to begin with?
01:45And just, again, coaching and goaltending usually plays a big part in who wins the NHL Stanley Cup, and Florida's got an edge in both of those spots.
01:54Like, it's really simple to play out as a coach, too, right?
01:57Like, you understand you don't like the way Skinner's been playing here, and Picard came on and gave you a little bit of a boost there.
02:01You win that game.
02:02But that's when, right after the game, you go, there is no controversy and goal.
02:06Skinner's going to start next.
02:07He just didn't have it tonight because then you build him up.
02:09And even, Joe, if you get into game number five and Skinner gives up a bad goal in the first three minutes, it's okay to pull him at that point and say, okay, well, it just wasn't his.
02:16We tried to prop him up.
02:17But the fact that it's like we're going to go backup when you know that backup isn't a great goal.
02:21It's not like you have Dominic Hoshik.
02:23Hey, he just came out of retirement.
02:24He looks fantastic at 29 years old.
02:25Let's put him in there and get hot.
02:27That's not the case here.
02:28You didn't have a pedigree goalie coming in.
02:30I thought that was certainly a tough look for them.
02:32Now, as we take a look at the standings here for the series, look at this.
02:35The Oilers, a plus 310 price as a dog, minus 400 for the Panthers.
02:40And for me, beating the Panthers back-to-back, won their own building, and you still got to beat them if you do there.
02:45Take it to a game number seven.
02:46I don't know.
02:47Like, I don't want to buy in on the Oilers at plus 310.
02:49I don't know if I want to lay the minus 400.
02:51But, boy, it's going to be hard for me to say, I think the Oilers can win this series.
02:55It looks like a Panthers series from here on out for me, Joe.
02:58Yeah, I mean, listen.
03:00The couple of games that Edmonton has lost, they have lost epically.
03:08The games in which Edmonton has won, Florida didn't play its best hockey.
03:14I can promise you, Florida coming home has no interest in hopping back on a plane to go across the continent to play a game seven.
03:22It's over in game six.
03:25Sorry to tell you, Edmonton.
03:26And I don't care who you're putting in golf.
03:30Look, if you're Florida, you understand the task at hand.
03:34And it's not like, like, let's just say it was Florida, and I know it can't happen, like Tampa Bay in the Stanley Cup finals.
03:38I was like, all right, we got to go, like, 100 miles, 75 miles.
03:41Do you think that Florida wants to win a Stanley Cup?
03:44I'm like, you know what would be awesome if we lost at home, which everybody wants to celebrate on their home ice,
03:49to go 3,500 miles away and win it in the Pacific Northwest?
03:52No.
03:52They understand the task at hand.
03:54It's closing them out.
03:55More interesting Stanley Cup talk action coming up next right here on The Early Line.
04:00Love this, man.
04:01Stanley Cup, NBA action all at once, entertaining series, overtimes galore in the NHL,
04:07which I want to focus on something which I always think is interesting.
04:10We talked in the NBA just a little bit.
04:11Hey, you know what?
04:12Okay, see if they win.
04:13You know it's going to be SGA winning the MVP.
04:16But understand this.
04:17That's the NBA finals MVP, Joe Renier, which some people don't understand where, oh, the cons might.
04:22That's the same thing.
04:23Stanley Cup finals MVP.
04:24No, Stanley Cup playoffs MVP.
04:28The reason I bring that up is if you're just watching from a finals perspective, it's Brad Marchand.
04:32Like, you know what?
04:33If it only counts in the Stanley Cup finals itself, he should be the runaway.
04:36And you say, wait a second.
04:38Sam Bennett here, minus 165 price.
04:39Marchand is plus 440.
04:41That's ridiculous.
04:42Because once again, it's the entirety of the playoff run, which Bennett does have, I believe, more points and also more goals.
04:48Now, Marchand, if he scores a game six overtime winner to give them the Stanley Cup,
04:52could that be enough to propel him?
04:54Yes, it could.
04:55But understand this.
04:56Is it just Bennett and Marchand for you?
04:58Or how about this?
04:59Bobrovsky's 110 to 1 price.
05:01Could he stand on his head in game six with a shutout and possibly take that down?
05:05How are we feeling about the Conn Smythe trophy odds right now at the FanDuel Sportsbook here?
05:09Yeah, listen, I think Marchand still, from a value perspective, even at, what, four or five to one here, Donnie, is not a bad bet.
05:19Keeping in mind, again, this is a popularity contest.
05:23The one thing I can guarantee is that the Conn Smythe is not going to a losing team.
05:28So, you know, a player on the losing team is not winning the Conn Smythe.
05:32When this series started, the overwhelming favorite was Conor McDavid.
05:38He got his first goal of this series last game.
05:42So, throw him out.
05:43It's Sam Bennett who leads, I believe, in all scoring in the playoffs.
05:48He's got more goals than anything.
05:50And ironically enough, I believe almost all those are on the road, which is hilarious here.
05:55But Marchand could very well steal the show.
05:58And if you can get him at four or five to one, that's your value play if you don't have a ticket in the Conn Smythe market yet.
06:06Let's take a look here.
06:07Game number six will be tomorrow night down there in Sunrise, Florida.
06:11And I find this interesting.
06:12The opening number, Joe, at the FanDuel Sportsbook here in New Jersey, a minus 140 price.
06:16It is a little bit higher at minus 146.
06:18There are some minus 150s out there in the sportsbook landscape.
06:22A total, once again, at six and a half.
06:23Look, they're both really good teams.
06:26It could go either direction.
06:27I didn't think, like, in the last game that was home for Florida that, you know, Edmonton were able to come back and win, and they did that.
06:32But I am surprised that it opened up as a minus 140 price.
06:35I thought that would be around that minus 160.
06:37Now, granted, the series hasn't really said, well, it's a blowout either way.
06:41These teams have played very good hockey.
06:42But it did catch me by surprise.
06:43Like, I think that number's a little bit cheap on Florida.
06:45I just do.
06:47I agree with you here.
06:49I think when you look at both of these teams and the path here and the fact that the Panthers already beat Edmonton a year ago for the Stanley Cup and everything we heard about this team coming into it was that they retooled.
07:05Retooled, they brought in different players, they built themselves to beat the Panthers.
07:10And yet, Donnie, we have watched them make the same stupid mistakes that they made last year with the two best players in the world on the team.
07:18You know, some teams, it's just hard to get over that hump.
07:21How many years did it take Jordan to beat the Detroit Pistons, right, before he gets started?
07:26Edmonton's just, to me, not there yet.
07:29And the fact that your coach and your goaltending situation is suspect, you're not winning a game on the road for the Stanley Cup championship.
07:37One team has been cool as a cucumber.
07:40The other team has been frantic.
07:42Who are you going to go with?
07:43I'm with you.
07:43I think this should have been a much higher price.
07:46And it may get there before it's all said and done, too, before the puck drops.
07:49We'll find out right away.
07:51It's going to be fun here.
07:52Again, a Stanley Cup can be won tomorrow night in Sunrise, Florida.
07:55It can be the Panthers here.
07:56If they don't win that game, we go to the almighty game number seven back in Edmonton.
08:01All right.
08:01Welcome back in here.
08:02The early line as we get ready for not only all important game five in the NBA tonight, tomorrow night, a possible closeout to the NHL Stanley Cup finals game six in Sunrise, Florida.
08:17I'm Joe Ranieri alongside Tom Vecchio.
08:20And, Tom, you and I talked before this series.
08:23The whole world thought that McDavid and Dreisaitl were going to run over this Florida team.
08:29And here we are in a game six with Florida over an opportunity not to get on a plane and close it out.
08:35You and I had talked.
08:37I said, listen, I got goaltending advantage and coaching advantage.
08:40And those two things reared their head again.
08:44Starting Picard in game five was a head scratcher to me.
08:47What did you think of it?
08:49And now what?
08:49Skinner on the road for a closeout game?
08:52How confident are you?
08:54I'm not.
08:55I think that's the short answer.
08:56Like, a team that has goalie issues or goalie questions or changing goalies, polling goalies, whatever it might be, in the Stanley Cup finals is not a team that is destined to win.
09:07If you have those type of issues, you have issues, right?
09:10That's just what it comes down to.
09:11If, theoretically, a team, I don't know, we're going to be starting Jacob deGrom or Max Scherzer at their prime in a World Series closeout game, like, okay, we got some issues here.
09:19That's what this is akin to.
09:21So, when we look at the most recent game, Picard, yeah, I think they had to change it just because of how bad Stuart Skinner was.
09:27But now going back to Skinner doesn't promote any type of confidence when it comes to the Oilers coming away with the win.
09:32I said this last night to Adam and Brady on game time decisions.
09:35If the Oilers do not score first, they do not win this game.
09:39If they go down, they're going to lose this game.
09:41Now, if the Oilers score first and then the Panthers come back and the New Orleans take back the lead, they can kind of manage that type of game.
09:47But if they fall behind, they will lose.
09:50It's kind of crazy here.
09:52I mean, it's six and a half.
09:54I can't imagine sweating out an under now if you've been backing overs and first period overs.
10:00You've cashed in every game here.
10:03If it ain't broke, don't fix it.
10:04Just keep backing the over, you think?
10:06I think that's an easy way to go about it.
10:09I will say, you know, from like a hockey analytics perspective that I'm looking at, I can make the case that multiple of these games should have fallen under.
10:16The Oilers taking on a billion penalties.
10:17It was a game three, provides extra scoring opportunities for the Panthers.
10:21That happens.
10:22In this most recent game, we had the empty netter, which pushed it over.
10:24It ended 5-2.
10:25If that didn't happen, it would have been 4-2, which fell under.
10:27And then, again, I'm looking at some of these expected goal numbers.
10:30The Panthers were at 3.2 expected goals in 5-5 situations.
10:33And the Oilers were at 2.29.
10:35So, did the Panthers score a bit more than they should have?
10:37Sure, not counting that empty net goal.
10:39And sure, should regression be coming?
10:42Eventually, it will happen.
10:43In a one-game sample size, tomorrow night, will it happen?
10:45I don't know.
10:46Because if the Oilers continue to take penalties, I'm not confident anything's going to happen with them.
10:50So, I think the over is the right play because, again, what have we seen or not seen from the Oilers' defense?
10:56They can't stop anything.
10:59Yeah, especially the power play, the Panther power play.
11:02You had looked at over 27.5 saves for Bobrovsky.
11:08So, a lot of guys were continuing to roll that.
11:11He didn't get worked very much in Edmonton last game.
11:15You think it happens this game?
11:16So, the first two games of the series, he obviously goes over that number.
11:20But some of those games go into overtime and or double overtime.
11:23So, we have to remember that this is a 60-minute line for his saves.
11:26Now, he would have gone over in two of the first three games.
11:29Despite overtime, he would have gone over this number.
11:31The last game, he obviously didn't go over.
11:33When it comes – this backs against the wall for the Oilers.
11:35So, I would say, just from a very simple perspective, if the Oilers are not taking shots on goal
11:41and they're not forcing Bobrovsky to make saves, objectively, they're not doing something right.
11:45So, when we see the Oilers with three, eight, and ten shots on goal in the three periods of the most recent game,
11:50that's bad.
11:51You can't have three shots on goal an entire period.
11:53That is just – backs against the wall.
11:54You can't be doing that.
11:55So, if Bobrovsky isn't forced to make, let's say, 30 saves, the Oilers are not going to win.
12:00That's what I really think comes down to.
12:02They're not going to score four goals on 26 shots against Bobrovsky.
12:06They shoot.
12:06They have to score early.
12:08None of that happens.
12:09The Panthers dog walk and they win this game.
12:11Yeah, and that's a big if here.
12:16Obviously, both these teams know each other very well.
12:19I think the Conn Smythe is interesting.
12:21If Florida wins, is it Bennett or Marshawn?
12:25I think it's Bennett.
12:26I think that's what they give it to him.
12:27I have a Bobrovsky ticket at 3.5 to 1.
12:30Listen, Bobrovsky shutout.
12:32They gave it to him this year because they didn't give it to him last year,
12:34and they gave it to McDavid last year.
12:36I want to see Bobrovsky come away with a shutout to give at least my tickets, I hope.
12:39Obviously, to him 101 or whatever it is at this point, I think it should go to Bennett
12:43because the series-defining goals he's had not just in this series but throughout the
12:47entire playoffs, which is what this award is for, I think he does deserve it.
12:52Yeah, listen, there's been no question.
12:56Playoff Bob has been alive and well here, and he's a big reason why they are one game
13:01away from clinching that second straight Stanley Cup championship.
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