The matchup for the 2024 Stanley Cup Final is set, but we’ll have to wait a little longer for the actual games between the Edmonton Oilers and Florida Panthers to take place. The puck drops for Game 1 on Saturday, June 8, making for a six-day gap between the end of the conference finals and the start of the Cup Final. That delay is tied with the 2007, 2019 and 2023 Playoffs for the longest such moratorium in the post-lockout era. And while nearly a week without playoff hockey creates a void for fans, the intricacies of the waiting period offer many other points of interest as well, both positive and negative for the teams involved and the greater hockey community. Florida, Edmonton and the NHL world have no choice but to embrace the time off, and while it will offer benefits, it could raise some understandable complaints at the same time.
Panthers and Oilers Get to Recharge
The Stanley Cup Playoffs are a grind. They are lengthy, physically demanding and obviously rewarding for whichever team reaches 16 wins. Given that winning a conference championship is an accomplishment in itself, it makes sense for the teams that do so to get a smaller reward in the process. That comes in the form of the current cooling-off period, which the players can use to refuel and be as prepared as possible for the Final.
Players such as Connor McDavid and Aleksander Barkov are having spectacular postseasons. Fans of both teams, as well as fans around the league, should want them to rest up and be fully ready to go for Game 1. Both fan bases want their best players at full strength, and neutral fans want both teams at their maximum health for the most exciting series possible. This is particularly relevant in McDavid’s case, given his injury concerns towards the end of the regular season.
But it’s not just the stars that deserve consideration. Players up and down the lineup are going through a grueling postseason run. Six weeks into the journey, they have almost certainly built up smaller, nagging injuries that limit their performance somewhat. At this point in the playoffs, practically everyone is banged up. A six-day break is the perfect time to shake off at least some of those hits and get ready to make one last push for the Cup.
Layoff Allows Time for Hype to Build
A championship playoff matchup deserves buildup and anticipation. The Cup Final is the culmination of a long season, and it should be treated as such. By giving space between the conference finals and the championship round, the NHL allows excitement to build. The Super Bowl is the most-watched sporting event in North America for a number of reasons, but the fact that it’s played two full weeks after the conference championship games is unquestionably a factor. Given that it’s a single game, it’s not a perfect comparison to the Stanley Cup Final, but it still shows the benefits of a layoff from the league’s perspective.
Pivoting from the conference finals to the Cup Final too quickly can be jarring. For as dizzying as the playoffs can be, fans get time to catch their breath and reinvigorate for the last round. The delay also benefits the media, giving writers and analysts plenty of time to find and tell all the stories that emerge from an Oilers-Panthers matchup. Whether it’s the paths that have gotten teams to this point or breakdowns of the series’ most intriguing matchups, everyone gets time to fully digest what has happened so far and what is coming, and that’s a positive.
The buzz surrounding this series is growing, and will continue to do so over the next few days. That drama will be able to reach an extra level thanks in large part to the six-day wait.
End of Cup Final Could Cram Schedule
While the scheduling of this year’s Cup Final limits chaos on the front end, it does the opposite on the back end.
If the series were to go a full seven games — certainly a possibility in part due to both teams being well-rested — then Game 7 would be on June 24, a Monday. The first night of the NHL Entry Draft would then take place the following Friday, June 28, with free agency starting on Monday, July 1. That is simply too many events stuffed into such a short period of time. To go just four days between what would be the biggest game of the year and a monumental league-wide event is a shift that could cause some serious whiplash. A mere one-week gap between said game and a period as important as free agency is perhaps even more absurd.
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The end of on-ice competition in a given season doesn’t mean the work is over for NHL teams. Front offices and players — including those in Edmonton and Florida — have plenty of decisions to make about their futures, and asking them to make some of those decisions just a few days after the most important game of their lives isn’t fair. Ultimately, the layoff is good for the beginning of June, but could leave a negative impact by the end of the month.
More Rest May Actually Be Harmful
While it’s good for players to get some time between series to prioritize their health, there may be such a thing as too many days off. Of the 18 championship-winning teams since the 2005 Lockout, only four — the 2009 Pittsburgh Penguins, 2010 Chicago Blackhawks, 2012 Los Angeles Kings and 2022 Colorado Avalanche — entered the Stanley Cup Final with more rest than their opponent following their victory in the conference finals.
While this may seem counterintuitive at first glance, it does carry some logic. Teams certainly like to win series quickly and get rest, but after a certain amount of time, the players may get rusty. Often, the team that played hockey more recently is more in the groove and has an easier time carrying the momentum of the previous series into the next one. Perhaps the NHL could mitigate this with a more dynamic scheduling model that adjusts the start of the Cup Final based on when the conference finals ended, but they chose not to do so.
By the way, if you’re wondering what all of this might mean for this year’s Final, the Oilers will enter Game 1 having gone six days between games, while the Panthers will have gone seven.
Oilers and Panthers Make for an Exciting Matchup
The contrast between Edmonton’s high-powered offense and Florida’s stalwart defense, along with the star power on both teams, will make for a fascinating battle. Thanks to the NHL’s scheduling, the two teams will be about evenly rested for the contest, with plenty of time for fans to get ready as well. But the flip side could entail an incredibly short amount of time to get ready for other important dates on the hockey calendar. The layout of the schedule will continue to vary from year to year, and the discussion about the right way to do it won’t be going away anytime soon. In the meantime, we can be thankful for what should be a great series.