For the second year in a row, the Edmonton Oilers fell short in the Stanley Cup Final against the Florida Panthers, and it stings just as much, if not more.

For the most part, it’s tough to pin the series loss solely on a single player, because credit to Florida, they’re a tremendous hockey team. While we wait to learn the extent of the injuries some Oilers may have been playing through, there were certainly players who could’ve contributed more. Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl combined for 16 points in the Final, but neither truly hit that next level. Still, several other players needed to step up, and below are five key Oilers the team needed more from in the Final.

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins was one of the hottest Oilers heading into the Stanley Cup Final, after putting on a clinic in the Western Conference Final against the Dallas Stars with nine points in five games.

Because of his great point production against Dallas, if I were to have put money on it, I would’ve wagered that Nugent-Hopkins was going to outdo his two points from the Cup Final last year against the Panthers. Unfortunately, he didn’t surpass it this time around; he just equaled the total in one less game. Having said that, the 32-year-old appeared to be dealing with an injury — the nature of which is still unknown at the time of writing — as he missed multiple practices in the final round.

Nugent-Hopkins showed up to play in Game 4, scoring an absolute laser on the power play — beating Sergei Bobrovsky high for the Oilers’ first goal in a 5–4 come-from-behind win. He also picked up an assist with a relentless forecheck on Jake Walman’s goal in the same game.

Yet, Edmonton needed more from their longest-serving Oiler, as Game 4 was the only game he recorded points. We’ll likely find out what Nugent-Hopkins was dealing with injury-wise, but it’s disappointing he couldn’t make more of an impact in his Cup Final redemption, having finished the series with only two points and a -4 rating. However, on the whole, the versatile forward had a strong playoff run overall, tallying 20 points in 22 postseason games.

Oilers’ defenceman Mattias Ekholm returned to the lineup in the final game against the Dallas Stars after missing most of the playoffs due to injury. Despite registering five points in six games in the Finals, including a goal in Game 1, he looked a step behind overall, lacking mobility, especially when turning, and made decisions that weren’t quite the ‘Mattias Ekholm-esque’ plays Oilers fans have come to expect. In addition, what the Oilers needed more from Ekholm was the defensive-minded stability he usually brings to the blue line, but clearly, he wasn’t the same due to the lingering effects of his injury.

Some of the most noticeable missteps happened in Game 5. Ekholm got caught flat-footed and was walked by Brad Marchand, who moved from outside to inside, created separation, and scored the opening goal on a breakaway. Later, on the Panthers’ second goal, the Oilers’ D-man failed to get the puck deep into Florida’s zone, leading to a scoring chance the other way that Florida converted, and he finished the night with a -3 rating.

In Game 6, a glaring play that showed Ekholm wasn’t his usual self was the hideous pass he gave to Evan Bouchard right before the Panthers’ opening goal. What should’ve been a routine saucer pass to his defence partner instead was a grenade of a pass that bounced off Bouchard’s shin pads. The play put Bouchard in a bad spot, leading to a turnover, and Sam Reinhart scored his first of four goals that night. Ekholm finished Game 6 with a -2 rating.

Overall, Ekholm wasn’t at 100% coming back from injury, which makes me wonder if the Oilers should have kept him sidelined and stuck with the blue line pairings they used for most of the series against Dallas. It’s a tough call since, when healthy, Ekholm is arguably their best blueliner.

Connor Brown missed the final two games of the Dallas series after taking a big hit from D-man Alex Petrovic, but returned to the lineup for Game 1 against the Panthers. In saying that, heading into the Cup Final, I thought he could be an X-Factor, as he was coming in playing steady hockey with nine points in 14 playoff games.

Moreover, I felt that, having beaten Bobrovsky last year in Game 5 with a highlight-reel shorthanded goal, Brown might have had his number. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Despite having a breakaway chance early in this year’s Game 5, the 31-year-old registered only one assist in six games during the Final, even while playing on a line with McDavid in Games 4 and 5. And if you dig into the advanced metrics, it doesn’t get any better — Natural Stat Trick had the Panthers ahead 45–23 in scoring chances at 5-on-5, and 22–9 in high-danger looks, with Brown on the ice.

We’ll likely learn soon whether Brown was playing through an injury from the hit he took from Petrovic, as it may have affected his ability to make an impact in the Final. Overall, Brown had some solid moments in the 2025 playoffs, including a three-point night in Round 1 against the Los Angeles Kings. He’s set to become an unrestricted free agent, and it’ll be interesting to see if the Oilers choose to bring him back for another run at the Cup.

Oilers forward Evander Kane played injured last year in the playoffs, and by the time he reached the Cup Final, his injuries were so bad that he only played in two games and was scratched for the rest of the series. Heading into this year’s Finals, I thought a healthier Kane was going to be a difference-maker, heading into the series with 11 points (5G, 6 A) in 15 playoff games, playing strong hockey after missing almost an entire year.

He scored a wonderful goal in Game 2, beating Bobrovsky from distance, and led the Oilers with 27 hits in six Finals games, but that’s about it on the positive side. In total, he received 32 penalty minutes in the series, which includes four stick infraction penalties over three consecutive first periods, two of which the Panthers capitalized on.

Additionally, Kane received a 10-minute misconduct for slashing Matthew Tkachuk with just over two minutes left in Game 6 — a moment that seemed to sum up his Cup Final, where stick infractions became a theme.

That said, the rugged forward has one more year left on his contract, and it’ll be interesting to see if he remains with the team next season, especially since Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman recently said there ‘will be a market for him.’ Overall, he had a good playoff run but came up short in the Finals.

Stuart Skinner deserves credit for bouncing back after being re-inserted into the playoff lineup in Game 3 against the Vegas Golden Knights when Calvin Pickard went down with an injury. In the eight games that followed, he went 6-2-0, posting a 1.88 goals-against average (GAA) and a .926 save percentage (SV%).

Yet, in the five games played against the Panthers in the Finals, he posted a 3.97 GAA and a .861 SV%, numbers that ultimately weren’t enough to get the job done.

It’s tough to blame him for the series loss, considering he made several crucial saves throughout. I think back to Game 1, where the Oilers’ win wouldn’t have happened without him making at least a couple of Grade A stops to keep his team in the fight. Also, for long stretches throughout the series, he wasn’t getting much support from the team in front of him, either.

However, there were also moments throughout the series where you thought, ‘If he could’ve just made that save’ — like the double overtime breakaway winner in Game 2, or the Panthers’ opening goal on their first shot in Game 6. Then there was the third goal against in Game 6, where a ‘nothing’ shot bounced off Skinner’s shoulder. Instead of smothering the puck, it popped out to Aleksander Barkov, who slid it over to Reinhart, and it deflected off him and in. After that late second-period tally, my hope for a comeback began to fade, as the uphill battle only got steeper heading into the third.

While he was largely stellar in the eight playoff games leading to the Cup Finals, simply put, the Oilers needed more from their starting netminder against the Panthers. Moreover, after the Game 6 loss, some in Oil Country may feel Skinner has played his last game in an Oilers uniform, which is understandable, and only time will tell.

In the end, he was outdueled by Sergei Bobrovsky, who is ten years older than him. In the postgame interview, Skinner said, ‘I would love to get in touch with him and ask how I could fill his shoes and do what he does. I’m definitely hoping that’s my trajectory, but that’s going to have to come from me.’

The bright side is that Skinner is just 26 years old and in only his third full NHL season, and with support from his crease partner, Pickard, he helped his team reach the Stanley Cup Final two seasons in a row. With that experience and considering his age, his trajectory should lead him to become a reliable and consistent goaltender between the pipes — but the question remains whether that’s in Edmonton or another NHL city.