Connor McDavid stands in the middle of the locker room.
The Edmonton Oilers captain’s voice rises as he emphatically calls on teammates to give more. His passionate, expletive-laden message — a side rarely, if ever, seen publicly from the superstar centre — reflects the level of urgency in his team’s Stanley Cup quest.
Edmonton has just lost Game 2 of the final to fall behind the Florida Panthers 2-0 in the title series.
“Not f–king good enough,” McDavid says in a tirade that includes 14 f-bombs in 45 seconds.
A camera was there to capture the moment — albeit one partially obstructed by an Oilers staff member holding up a black curtain — and plenty more across the NHL last season.
The six-part Faceoff: Inside the NHL docuseries, a behind-the-scenes sports showcase from Prime Video, debuts Friday.
McDavid’s group would indeed “dig in” as he implored, battling back from a 3-0 deficit to force Game 7 in a memorable series with massive momentum swings, but ultimately fell short in a slugfest that ended in tears in the bowels of Florida’s Amerant Bank Arena last June.
“It’s so f–king hard,” a member of the Oilers says in the raw, immediate aftermath before the cameras are ordered to leave following the gut-wrenching loss.
Unlike past NHL reality endeavours that largely focused on teams, this show aims to bring viewers closer than ever before to hockey’s stars, on and off the ice.
McDavid and a pair of teammates, Leon Draisaitl and Zach Hyman, feature prominently.
The same goes for Toronto Maple Leafs star William Nylander, Vancouver Canucks captain Quinn Hughes, Boston Bruins sniper David Pastrnak, Panthers winger Matthew Tkachuk and a host of other big names.
“You’re getting a series that, for the first time, probably has buy-in from everyone,” Hyman said in a recent interview. “Everybody wants to open the doors and show you what’s under the hood, which has not really been done before.”
The docuseries is an Amazon project in conjunction with Box to Box Films, the company behind a long list of all-access sports series, including Netflix’s Formula 1: Drive to Survive.
The players have seen their episodes, but Hyman doesn’t think he will ever watch the finale.
“You lived through it,” he said. “It’ll be really interesting for fans to see an inside look into what it’s like to go through that journey and to ultimately fall just short.
“Pretty devastating and the cameras have access to all of that.”
On-the-bench access
NHL players have historically guarded their…
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