FORT LAUDERDALE — Game 7 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final may end up being one of the most iconic games in NHL history. There is so much on the line for both the Florida Panthers and Edmonton Oilers — so much drama and build-up surrounding how that Game 7 came to be — that it almost can’t not be. For the Panthers, the difference between winning and losing this game means everything to this franchise.
If they win, it would bring a championship and a lasting sense of credibility for a team that spent a better part of two decades as the laughing stock of the NHL. Those years of the arena being half-empty and ownership needing to BOGO ticket deals or free burger and beer nights to get people to get in the building? They will not be coming back any time soon, not after the hype a championship would bring to this team. If they lose tonight? That’s a whole different story.
No One Covers the Florida Panthers Like FHN. Period. The Panthers would become just the second team in NHL history to blow a 3-0 lead in the Stanley Cup Final and lose the series — joining the 1942 Detroit Red Wings who did so against the Toronto Maple Leafs — and you would be hard-pressed to find a more comparable collapse in modern memory.
Based off the conversation on Twitter, the casual fans are too fickle to stick around after such embarrassment. And the Panthers would be hard-pressed to earn their trust back. After a collapse like that, the Panthers would go back to being a laughing stock, even if.
