The Amerant Bank Arena echoed with chants of “We want the Cup!” as the clock ran down on Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Finals. The Florida Panthers entered the series with a 3-2 lead and closed things out with a 5-1 victory against the Edmonton Oilers, who had seemed lost throughout the sixty minutes. For the Cats, it was them sealing their status as back-to-back Stanley Cup champions while becoming just the third team this century to do so.

Sam Reinhart stole the spotlight by scoring four goals and a hat trick that left fans hurling rats and hats while celebrating. And Matthew Tkachuk delivered the Cup-clinching goal, with Sergei Bobrovsky standing tall in the net, turning away 28 of 29 shots. And it all started with one costly mistake from the Oilers.

Less than 5 minutes into the first period, with no real pressure on him, Mattias Ekholm delivered an ill-advised pass to Evan Bouchard, who took his own sweet time trying to settle the puck down, giving the Panthers’ Sam Reinhart the perfect opportunity to pick his pocket and score a breakaway goal. “Defense turns into offense for the Selke finalist,” Jameson Olive, senior digital content manager for the Florida Panthers, posted on X. And just like that, Edmonton found themselves trailing in the first period. Again.

As disheartening as it was for the Oilers faithful, the Panthers dominating Kris Knoblauch’s boys in the first period had become a recurring pattern. Over the first five games of the series, the Miami-based team had outscored their rivals from the north 11-4 in the first twenty minutes. Even the two games (1 & 4) that went the Oilers’ way were comeback victories, which had them trailing 2-1 and 3-0 in the first period, respectively. “They’re a good team for a reason and they’ve come out and showed that early in the games, and we have to find a way to be better at the start,” Ekholm told the NHL after the loss in Game 5, which also started with the Panthers taking a 2-0 lead in the opening twenty minutes. Incidentally, that’s also how the first period ended in Game 6.

And while the Oilers lost the series and the Stanley Cup, what perhaps added insult to injury was that they also helped their rivals register a rather interesting record.

The Edmonton Oilers chased the Panthers for far too long

With poor first-period displays, the Oilers allowed Florida to control the pace and momentum night after night. Because each time the Panthers struck first, they not only took command of the scoreboard but also added to their total time spent in the lead. Hence, when Reinhardt and Tkachuk gave Florida a 2-0 edge in this one, they sealed more than just the championship.

Chris Jastrzembski, the NHL insider and TNT researcher, pointed out just how dominant the Panthers were, going past the 1987 Oilers to set a new Stanley Cup Final record. “Should the Panthers not lose the lead tonight, they will have led for 255:49, a Stanley Cup Final record surpassing the 1987 Oilers (250:04),” Jastrzembski wrote on X. And hey, they did it by breaking the record of the team that featured Hockey Hall of Fame icons like Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier, and Jari Kurri.

Thanks to that, Paul Maurice became only the 18th coach in the history of the NHL to win the Stanley Cup back to back. For the Oilers, the wait that began in 1990 will spill over to yet another year.