10 Interesting (To Me) Stats For This Week - June 2

Welcome back to another week of ’10 Interesting Stats’. The Stanley Cup Final rematch is set with the Edmonton Oilers looking for revenge on their seven-game loss to the Florida Panthers from a year ago. A lot of familiar names are still around, but there are new faces that will have a hand at deciding the winner. Here is the breakdown with player data from Natural Stat Trick, goalie data from Evolving Hockey, and tracking data from All Three Zones. We are starting with Florida and then moving to Edmonton. (Note: There is one game missing in the tracking data from Edmonton’s Western Conference Final.)

1 – What About Bob?

In a very handy coincidence, Florida goalie Sergei Bobrovsky has started 17 games to this point in the Panthers’ playoff run, the same total at this point last season. It gives us an opportunity to compare his performances, and right up until Game 17 of the respective playoff runs, Bobrovsky’s cumulative even strength Goals Saved Above Expected (GSAx) was very similar before a divergence in the East Final clinching game:

The two paths are distinct with last season being a more consistent effort and this season being a poor start followed by steady improvement, but both years show that his even strength performance got better as the team got deeper into the postseason.

2 – Shut It Down

The Conference Final preview highlighted how Florida’s top pair of Gustav Forsling and Aaron Ekblad wasn’t having a great defensive performance, especially relative to their depth. That continued in the Conference Final as the team had better defensive numbers with them off the ice at 5-on-5.

It isn’t all that straightforward, though. The Forsling-Ekblad pair is often used in a shutdown role, and despite that tough sledding, the team is carrying the play in those minutes. Here is how Florida fared by share of shot attempts (CF%), share of expected goals, and share of goals at 5-on-5 when on the ice against Nikita Kucherov from Tampa Bay, Auston Matthews from Toronto, and Sebastian Aho from Carolina:

Carrying the play is a great sign, but the playoffs are about goals for and against, and Connor McDavid is looming on the horizon. The process has been good so far, but the results have not, and as a wise man once said: Process doesn’t pay the bills.

3 – All These Things They’ve Done

A key component of last year’s Cup-winning Florida roster was the penalty kill as they gave up nine power-play goals against on their opponent’s 75 power plays, or a PK rate just under 90%.

This year’s edition of the Florida penalty kill is tremendous once again. In fact, going back to the 2014 playoffs, this Panthers squad is 1 of 3 teams to have at least 75 minutes in penalty kill time at 4-on-5 while allowing under 40 shots against per 60 minutes and 4.0 goals against per 60 minutes:

Bobrovsky hasn’t needed to be as good as last year, but he’s still been very solid, so this is again an excellent penalty-killing team from top to bottom.

4 – Contract Performance

There are likely three things true about Florida centre Sam Bennett:

1. He isn’t as good as his biggest supporters make him out to be.

2. He isn’t as bad as his biggest detractors make him out to be.

3. He has been tremendous in the 2025 postseason.

To that final point, we’ll go to the tracking data. We are looking at eight categories ranging from assists on teammate scoring chances, to offence generated both off the rush and cycle, as well as zone entries. Here is the overall average ranking of Florida’s 12 most-used forwards at 5-on-5 across those eight categories:

Bennett has 10 goals, which leads the playoffs. He is also doing a lot to help his team generate offence, so those goals are being earned. Considering he’s a free agent this summer, it is a great time to have this kind of performance.

5 – We Go Deep and We Don’t Get No Sleep

If there is a common thread between the 2025 Florida and Edmonton teams, it’s that their depth has had a big impact on where they are. Overall, if we remove the top four forwards and top two defencemen in terms of ice time from the Florida roster in each of their last two postseasons, there has been a drastic improvement in the goal-scoring rate when comparing this year to last:

With the improvements to Edmonton’s depth scoring in this postseason, Florida mirroring that improvement is important. Even more important is the depth finishing the postseason strong and not fading away.

6 – Steamed Hams

Like Bobrovsky, Edmonton goalie Stuart Skinner had a slow start to the postseason but has steadily improved as the playoffs have evolved. There have been a couple poor games, but his Goals Saved Above Expected at even strength has been above zero for six of his last seven games. That is kind of important because his GSAx was not above zero at any point of the 2024 postseason:

Whether Oilers fans or analysts in general trust Skinner to have a productive Cup Final is up to the individual. The fact remains that he has been better this year than last, despite a few bumps along the way. In the 2024 Final, Skinner had a higher even strength GSAx (2.38) than Bobrovsky (0.11) and gave up just 16 goals in seven games. If Skinner can improve on last year’s performance in the Final as he has so far in these playoffs, it fundamentally changes the outlook for Edmonton’s chances.

7 – Return of the Ek

The return of Mattias Ekholm to Edmonton’s blue line is a huge addition as he’s a true top defenceman. It also brings the problem of where everyone fits in.

The injury to Ekholm pushed Evan Bouchard into a penalty kill role, and Bouchard’s rate of goals against when on the ice for a PK at 4-on-5 is the lowest among Edmonton’s four main penalty-killing defencemen. Conversely, the numbers with Darnell Nurse on the ice are awful and the team has had a much, much better PK with Nurse off the ice:

This was also the case in the regular season as Edmonton’s shot against and goals against numbers with Nurse on the ice were the worst of their top four penalty killing defencemen. There is a very good case that with Ekholm back, Nurse should be taken off the PK entirely. It is unlikely to happen, so the team better hope he improves drastically because that is something that loses games.

8 – Hy, Connor, Good To See You

On the injury front, losing Zach Hyman for the postseason is a big loss. The silver lining here is that between the regular season and playoffs, Edmonton has still had good numbers by shot attempt share, shot share, expected goal share, and goal share at 5-on-5 when Connor McDavid has been on the ice without Hyman and Leon Draisaitl:

This will be put to the test with McDavid often lining up against Aleksander Barkov and Sam Reinhart, particularly when the games are in Florida. If he can reproduce those results in that matchup, though, it’ll go a long way to alleviating the Hyman injury loss.

9 – New Year, New D

One aspect that has greatly helped Edmonton’s depth generate offence at 5-on-5 is the overhaul on the blue line. Adding both Jake Walman and John Klingberg brings two defencemen who can move the puck well, which is partly why the tracking data has this Edmonton defence group with far higher rates of zone exits with possession, as well as retrievals on dump-ins leading to zone exits, when compared to the previous two seasons:

Keep in mind, almost all of this has been done without Mattias Ekholm in the lineup. The Florida Panthers are a tremendous forechecking team, and efficiently moving the puck out of the defensive zone is one way to break down that forecheck. If Edmonton’s defencemen can maintain these improvements, it’ll be a big help to overcoming Florida’s strength.

10 – IT’S KANE!

It is easy to overlook just how much injuries have derailed Evander Kane’s recent seasons:

· Skate cut to his wrist in November of 2022 that caused him to miss 2 ½ months he never regained strength in that wrist until the following season.

· Played through injuries in the 2024 playoffs that resulted in surgeries to repair both abductors, abdominal tears, and two hernias, plus a knee scope in January of 2025.

That is a lot of surgical work. Including the cut wrist the season prior, it was a hellish two years.

That is why it’s important to highlight just how good he’s been in these playoffs. When compared to the prior two playoff runs, he has seen drastic increases in rate of goals, points, individual expected goals, and on-ice expected goal share and actual goal share at 5-on-5:

When Kane was healthy and at his best 3-5 years ago, he was a genuine top-line forward offensively. He has been that again in the 2025 postseason. Kane being this productive is a big reason why the Edmonton depth has been so much better this year, and if he can keep it up in the Final, it adds a dimension the team didn’t have last year.

Until next week.