Bobrovsky perfect as Panthers blank Oilers 4-0

EDMONTON – Sergei Bobrovsky made 21 saves to earn his fourth shutout of the season as the Florida Panthers continued to plague Edmonton, emerging with a 4-0 victory over the Oilers on Thursday in a rematch of the last two Stanley Cup finals.

Cole Reinhardt, A.J. Greer, Anton Lundell and Carter Verhaeghe scored for the injury-riddled Panthers (34-31-3), who snapped a two-game losing skid.

Sam Bennett, Evan Rodrigues and Michael Benning all had two assist games. The Panthers are almost certain to miss the playoffs and a chance to defend their back-to-back titles.

Connor Ingram made 19 stops in the loss for Edmonton (34-27-9).

The Oilers had a modest two-game winning streak halted and missed out on an opportunity to move ahead of idle Anaheim into first in the Pacific Division.

Edmonton remained without star forward Leon Draisaitl, out for the rest of the regular season with a lower body injury.

Takeaways

Panthers: Benning, a fourth-round (95th overall) selection in the 2020 Entry Draft by Florida, was playing in just his fourth career NHL game. The 24-year-old Edmonton-area native defenceman already has three points.

Oilers: Captain Connor McDavid is still two goals short of 400, one assist away from 800 and three points shy of 1,200 for his career.

Key moment:

Florida went up 3-0 on the power play with 5:39 to play in the second period as Lundell put away his 18th goal of the season on a loos puck in front of the net.

Key stat

Florida has been hit hard by injuries all season long with the most man-games lost in the league including many lengthy IR stints. Among those out of the lineup on Thursday were Aleksander Barkov, Brad Marchand and Sam Reinhart. Only defenceman Gustav Forsling has managed to appear in all 68 games this season. Conversely, six Oilers have played in every game: Connor McDavid, Matt Savoie, Vasily Podkolzin, Evan Bouchard, Mattias Ekholm, and Darnell Nurse.

Up next

Oilers: Host the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday.

Panthers: Visit the Calgary Flames on Friday.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 19, 2026.

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