We’re currently watching one of the greatest playoff performances ever from an NHL player.
Connor McDavid is making history and has, on his own, dragged the Edmonton Oilers within one to the Florida Panthers in the Stanley Cup Finals.
The Panthers held a 3-0 series lead but after two straight wins for the Oilers, pressure is starting to build, and the Oilers can thank their captain for it.
As the Oilers won Game 5 5-3, McDavid became the first player to post two straight four-point performances in the Stanley Cup Final in league history.
The only player who had two four-point games at any time in the Final was Wayne Gretzky, but the Oilers weren’t facing elimination then.
McDavid has won plenty of individual awards during his amazing career, but never the Stanley Cup.
Now, he has 42 points in the playoffs so far, ten more than anyone else, and only Wayne Gretzky and Mario Lemieux have had more points in a postseason run.
Connor McDavid needs five points in Game 6 and, if it comes to that, Game 7 to tie Gretzky for 47, and most in history.
Connor McDavid has also passed Mario Lemieux in points-per-game in the playoffs and only has Wayne Gretzky ahead of him.
And in Game 5, it wasn’t just that McDavid scored points; it was how he scored them that had fans’ jaws on the ground.
McDavid scored his first goal of the game in the second period with a shot from a sharp angle that caught Sergei Bobrovsky off guard.
He then took the puck deep in the Oilers zone and dangled through three Panthers players before setting up Corey Perry. It was an unbelievable assist, but something McDavid does on a regular basis.
Postgame, his teammates were in awe over their captain’s performance.
“I didn’t even yell for it,” Perry said about his goal. “He just saw me go to the net. That’s just the type of player he is.”
But the one who described McDavid’s performance best was Zach Hyman.
When asked about what he felt about McDavid’s four-point night, he just said, ’Connor doing Connor things.’
Hyman didn’t shy away from the fact that McDavid is currently keeping the Oilers in the playoffs.
”The biggest reason why we’ve come so far. We’re not here without him. He continues to drive the bus.”
