Oilers enter history books with 8-goal performance to stave off elimination in Final

Edmonton Oilers captain Connor McDavid put a dramatic, record-setting stamp on Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final, starring at Rogers Place on Saturday and rekindling memories of some rich NHL lore.

With the Oilers' backs to the elimination wall, down 3-0 at home in the best-of-7 Final to the Florida Panthers with the Stanley Cup polished and ready for presentation, McDavid scored once and assisted three times to propel his team's 8-1 win. His three assists give him 32 in the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs, passing the 31 that Oilers legend Wayne Gretzky piled up in 1988 en route to the Great One's fourth and final championship.

The victory sent the Final back to Florida's Amerant Bank Arena for Game 5 on Tuesday (8 p.m. ET; ABC, ESPN+, SN, TVAS, CBC), the Oilers needing to win again to force Game 6 back in Edmonton on Friday.

It was just the third time in NHL history that a team facing elimination in the Stanley Cup Final scored at least eight goals, getting up off the mat to see another game.

Toronto Maple Leafs captain Syl Apps cradles the stovepipe-design Stanley Cup following his team's historic 1942 championship, rallying from a 3-0 best-of-7 series deficit against the Detroit Red Wings.

In 1942, a historic comeback saw the Toronto Maple Leafs, down 3-1 to the Detroit Red Wings, win 9-3 on home ice in Game 5. Two more victories and Toronto became the only team in NHL history to rally down 3-0 in the Final to win the Stanley Cup, a feat the Oilers would love to duplicate.

And in 1973, the Chicago Black Hawks, trailing 3-1 to the Montreal Canadiens, outlasted their opponent with a wild 8-7 win at the Montreal Forum. They would lose back at Chicago Stadium, 6-4 in Game 6.

The 1942 Maple Leafs, who held 7-0 and 8-1 leads in Game 5, were carried by five-point nights from Don Metz (three goals, two assists) and Syl Apps (two goals, three assists) in what was the worst loss in Red Wings playoff history. Detroit goalie Johnny Mowers was lit up for all nine Toronto goals without a backup in the one-goalie era to relieve him.

Thirty-one years later, two goalies played more like screen doors than future Hockey Hall of Famers when the Black Hawks, shut out 4-0 at home by the Canadiens in Game 4, staved off elimination with their inexplicable victory in Game 5.

Future Hall of Fame goalies Ken Dryden of the Montreal Canadiens (left) and Tony Esposito of the Chicago Black Hawks were both lit up in Chicago's 8-7 Game 5 win in the 1973 Stanley Cup Final.

Canadiens goalie Ken Dryden had been awarded the Vezina Trophy as the best in the NHL at his position, his first of five 1970s wins of the then statistics-based prize (33-7 with 13 ties, a 2.26 goals-against average, .926 save percentage, six shutouts). The Canadiens scored 329 regular-season goals, one behind the NHL-leading Boston Bruins that dwarfed the 284 scored by the Black Hawks.

But the Final wouldn't be the cakewalk that some suggested it might be. Indeed, it was all over the map for a confounding six games. Montreal outscored Chicago 33-23 by the end of it, the 56 combined goals still a Stanley Cup Final series record.

The Canadiens opened at home with dominating 8-3 and 4-1 wins. If they were swaggering as they headed to Chicago, they were knocked down a peg with a 7-4 loss in Game 3. Dryden then blanked the Black Hawks 4-0 in Game 4, outdueling Tony Esposito to send the series back to Montreal for what many expected would be the Canadiens' home-ice coronation.

"It was crazy," Montreal legend Yvan Cournoyer recalled. "We were as stunned as anybody. We had no idea that was going to happen. It's like we were bowling, the score was so high."

Montreal Star coverage of the Chicago Black Hawks' stunning 8-7 win against the Canadiens in Game 5 of the 1973 Stanley Cup Final at the Montreal Forum.

It featured the most goals scored by two teams in a Stanley Cup Final game, having eclipsed by two the 13 scored in the Red Wings' 9-4 win against the Maple Leafs on April 7, 1936.

The eight second-period goals -- five by Chicago, one of four teams in history to do so -- set the Stanley Cup Final record for one period, equaled by the Vancouver Canucks and New York Rangers in the third period of Game 5 in 1994.

Every time either the Black Hawks or Canadiens scored in Game 5, the other tied it up until Chicago finally went ahead 7-5 late in the second. Montreal made it 7-6 early in the third before Lou Angotti scored what ultimately was the game-winner, Canadiens captain Henri Richard pulling his team within one at 11:43.

Stan Mikita and Jim Pappin each scored twice for Chicago, Claude Larose had two for Montreal.

The 1972-73 Chicago Black Hawks, one of three NHL teams to score eight or more goals in victory when facing Stanley Cup Final elimination.

"It was the kind of game that you think going into, 'We should play tight,'" Angotti said. "But then the goals start to come and after you get one, you start to think we should tighten up again. Then they get one and it just keeps going like that."

"All the newspapers thought tonight would be easy, but I didn't," Richard said. "I am very disappointed. This was not playoff hockey. If we didn't learn a lesson from tonight, we're stupid."

A Stanley Cup-clinching win in Game 6 suggested that the lesson was learned.

Neither Dryden nor Esposito, teammates for Team Canada in the landmark 1972 Summit Series, were in Hall of Fame form in Game 5. Chicago scored eight times on 29 shots, Dryden's save percentage a beer-league .724, with Montreal scoring seven times on 31 shots, Esposito at .774.

"Black Hawks stay alive in goalies' nightmare," the Montreal Star headlined its game story the next day.

Chicago Black Hawks forward Chico Maki (16) chases the puck around the net of Montreal Canadiens goalie Ken Dryden during the 1973 Stanley Cup Final. From left: Pete Mahovlich, Guy Lapointe, Pit Martin, Terry Harper, Jacques Laperriere and Jim Pappin.

Iconic Chicago Tribune hockey writer Bob Verdi described the shooting gallery as "a bizarre ballistics exhibition."

"Stupid," Cournoyer said postgame, echoing his captain.

"Close. Awful," added Canadiens forward Pete Mahovlich.

"Once a game starts wide open, it's difficult to kind of change it," Dryden told reporters. "You let a goal in, you don't feel too badly. You think you can get two back."

Said Chicago defenseman Pat Stapleton: "The Canadiens came out flying but then it all sort of fell apart and we just kept hanging in, hoping to get the last goal. That's all you can do."

Said Esposito: "Tonight, I was tired. That's all. The guys pulled me through."

Toronto Maple Leafs forward Don Metz scored three goals and added two assists in his team's 9-3 Game 5 win against the Detroit Red Wings in the 1942 Stanley Cup Final.

As for the Oilers and Panthers, everything resets for Game 5 in Sunrise, Florida, on Tuesday.

There is nothing to suggest that Panthers goalie Sergei Bobrovsky, brilliant through the postseason, will be lit up again. No one should assume that McDavid has another four points on his stick, the Oilers again skating into a must-win game.

But the beauty of Stanley Cup Final hockey is its unpredictability, like the 1942 Maple Leafs-Red Wings and 1973 Canadiens-Black Hawks series so wonderfully proved with plenty of ink on the score sheet.

On Tuesday, the Stanley Cup will again be polished and ready for presentation to the Panthers. The Oilers would love nothing more than to see hockey's sterling treasure put back in its case and shipped north to Edmonton.

Top photo: Edmonton Oilers captain Connor McDavid speaks to the media following his team's 8-1 Game 4 victory against the Florida Panthers on Saturday