Panthers and Oilers engage in all-out brawl as Florida takes control of Stanley Cup Final in Game 3 victory

While fighting is a regularity in the NHL there s a low percentage of it happening in Stanley Cup Playoff games Contest of the Stanley Cup Final though saw an all-out brawl in the Florida Panthers lopsided preeminence over the Edmonton Oilers to take a - lead in the series In their first home tournament of the best-of-seven series the Panthers took full advantage and the Oilers tried to get even in a physical way instead of on the scoreboard CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS COMThe battle was already - in favor of Florida when things were getting more chippy on the ice It reached a different level when Edmonton forward Trent Federic started to pick on Sam Bennett to the point where he cross-checked him down to the ice and Bennett retaliated with chosen punches as he got on top of Federic That initial fight led every participant on the ice to find a partner to duel with and the referees just let the brawl play itself out The Oilers Darnell Nurse and the Panthers Jonah Gadjovich clutched each other s sweaters and were throwing haymakers while Florida s A J Greer dueled with Edmonton s Mattias Ekholm After the fights fizzled out Nurse Godjovich Bennett Federic Greer and Ekholm were all called for tournament misconducts and sent off the ice for the remainder of the meeting STANLEY CUP FINAL FLORIDA PANTHERS EVEN UP SERIES AFTER THRILLING OT WIN AGAINST EDMONTON OILERSBut with nearly half of the third period still to play the tension between these two teams vying for Lord Stanley s Cup didn t stop It mainly came from the Oilers as Evander Kane was sent off the ice for the night after slashing Carter Verhaeghe in the face while he was down on the ice More penalties would be had as the clock kept ticking down and at that point both teams were just hoping no one would get hurt with much of this series left to play Even at the final buzzer Oilers star Corey Perry started jousting with multiple Panthers players as fans started throwing debris onto the ice In the end the Panthers responded to all the over-physical play by the Oilers with a power-play goal to cap their - domination as Evan Rodrigues hammered home a shot Other than the fights various tremendous offensive hockey was on display by Florida from the get-go as Brad Marchand potted one past Oilers goaltender Stuart Skinner just under one minute into the challenge Marchand became the oldest contestant in NHL history to points in each of the first three Stanley Cup Finals games But he isn t the only athlete to do so on his unit in this series Sam Bennett joined him in the second period after finding himself on a breakaway to the net thanks to Eetu Luostarinen intercepting an Edmonton pass at the blue line Bennett went backhand forehand on Skinner and buried his wrister top shelf to take a commanding - lead Amerant Bank Arena went berserk as Bennett s goal led to an eruption of cheering on and off the ice for the Panthers Verhaeghe also got into the goal column with a power-play goal assisted by Rodrigues and Nate Schmidt to go into the locker room up - Perry was able to get the Oilers a much-needed response with a power-play goal of his own at the beginning of the second period but Florida s physicality which was deemed legal by referees on the ice ultimately led to Bennett s goal and Sam Reinhart s before that Things came off the rails for Edmonton when Florida went back on the power play and their top unit put together a beautiful display of passing ending with Aaron Ekblad s wide-open net to wrist home the organization s fifth goal of the contest It was truly a announcement win for Florida who have all types of momentum heading into Event on Thursday night Follow Fox News Digital s sports coverage on X and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter