Stanley Cup Ultimate weblog: Connor Brown

Edmonton Oilers forward Connor Brown will be keeping his own blog throughout the 2025 Stanley Cup Final against the Florida Panthers. He will check in regularly with behind-the-scenes access.

In his first entry after a 4-3 overtime win in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final, Brown talks about the excitement of seeing Leon Draisaitl score the game-winning goal with 31 seconds remaining in overtime, the role the crowd at Rogers Place played in the game and what’s next for the Oilers as they prepare for Game 2 of this best-of-7 series on Friday.

Listen man, we came out of the gate, and we were the better team off the jump. The goal by Leon Draisaitl was huge at the start of the game. It gave us jump and got us into it in the best way possible.

From our perspective, I think Florida got away with one with that first goal.

Say what you want about him, Sam Bennett is a smart player, he feels a little bit of push and he lets his momentum take him right into the goalie. I don’t know if the tug was hard enough to take him into the goalie like that and then they score on the play.

Not only that, then they score on the power play after we lost the challenge, and we are down 2-1.

For us to have that start and then overcome that setback against a team that has been so good at holding the lead, it’s very encouraging.

They go up 3-1 after Bennett scores again and then we come back and win 4-3 in overtime; it’s a very encouraging sign for this group. It instills a lot of belief in our group.

We think we are a special team in here; we are not an ordinary group. We have unique talents all throughout our lineup. We are a deep team. We believe in our group, and we believe in what we can do. The manner in which we won this game instills a lot of belief in this group.

The atmosphere was incredible tonight, the building was so loud. We love playing in front of our fans. I think Trent Frederic said it best when he came here from Boston in a trade this year. He said it feels like hockey heaven, and it really is like that. The greatest players to ever play the game have come through here and the next generation of the greatest players are coming through here. It just feels a little surreal. It’s something that is not really quantifiable about playing in this building. It’s fun to be a part of.

It’s great to see Leon get those goals. I think he is a little fresher than last year. He’ll never say that because he is tough as an ox, but you can see it in his play. It’s obviously a good sign when the MVP of the League is feeling it out of the gate.

It was also great to see Mattias Ekholm score to tie it up. When he got hurt during the season and he was kind of battling it, a lot of us didn’t know if he would be back. We wondered if he was done until next year. To see ‘Ekkie’ back and not only playing but playing as well as he is and contributing in such a big way is amazing.

Now, it is up to us to own the win, understand what we did well and build on it.

You know when it was getting late into that overtime, you start thinking about double overtime. It’s only natural. You have to be prepared. You wanted it to end there on the power play, but we were ready for anything.

You know, the Leon goal happened so fast, but in the moment, it feels so slow, especially when there are a couple of nice plays as it develops like there were on that goal. For it to end like that on home ice, those are special moments.

Like I said, in the playoffs you can’t get too high, you can’t get too low, but at the same time, you have to own what you do well and own the situation we overcame today. We need to realize it’s not an accident and build off that with an even deeper sense of belief in our team.

We know what that team over there is capable of. We were on the other side of devastation last year. If anybody has the best idea of what they can do, it’s us. They took the rings off our fingers last year.

That is a team that has overcome a lot as well and by no means do we think they are going to roll over. They have a lot of belief in themselves as well.

It will make for a good series here.