Before Tarasenko’s goal, Edmonton had been carrying the play, outscoring Florida 21-14 at the time. The Oilers finished with a 35-23 advantage in shots, but despite closing the gap with two goals in the third period, they were unable to tie it.
“We’re shooting a lot of shots, but we can’t seem to get over the goal line,” Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl said. “We are not maintaining enough pressure. It’s very frustrating that we shot ourselves a little in the foot today. We made some individual and collective mistakes that they immediately took advantage of.”
Although Draisaitl remains second in the NHL in scoring this postseason with 28 points (10 goals, 18 assists) in 21 games, he has yet to record a point in the Finals. Zach Hyman, who leads the league in goals with 14, was also out. Connor McDavid has three assists and Evan Bouchard has one.
Edmonton’s power play has also cooled off. He is 0 for 10 in the finals, including 0 for 3 in Game 3.
“I thought we had a lot of looks. I thought the game was there and just a couple of mistakes and they found a way to score,” McDavid said. “I thought we did a good job of getting pucks to the net and bodies to the net. “We can’t score on the outside of these guys, we have to get to the middle.”
Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch believes that eventually the puck will start to bounce in his favor, something that almost happened in the third period.
Ryan McLeod had a chance to tie the game just over a minute after cutting it to 4-3 on a redirect at 14:43. McDavid pulled Sergei Bobrovsky out of position and centered a pass to McLeod, but was unable to lift it over the goalkeeper’s outstretched left pad.
“There is frustration because we are depressed, but there is a difference between frustration and quitting,” Knoblauch said. “There is absolutely no way out. “There is a belief that we can do it and we just have to keep pushing.”
