McDavid magic has kept the Stanley Cup Final going. Game 6 is the Oilers captain's next trick

EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) — Connor McDavid was surrounded by greatness.

His hair still wet from practice, he sat in Studio 99, the restaurant in the Edmonton Oilers' home arena named for Wayne Gretzky and full of memorabilia commemorating the legendary career of the “Great One." To his right was a jersey Gretzky wore during his first NHL season and on the wall to his left quotes from No. 99, who captained Edmonton to the Stanley Cup four times.

If McDavid keeps this up, the Oilers are going to have to make room for a Studio 97.

The heir apparent to Gretzky, Mario Lemieux and Sidney Crosby as the best hockey player in the world, McDavid has carried his team from the brink of elimination in the Stanley Cup Final against the Florida Panthers to a Game 6 on home ice Friday night. The only player in league history to record back-to-back four-point games in the final, the Oilers captain gets his next chance to add to his legacy and push the series to a deciding Game 7 back across the continent.

“You spend your life working to get into a position like this,” McDavid said Thursday. “You think that when you’re here it’s going to be some magic feeling, magic, I don’t know. You don’t know what to expect. To be honest, it’s all been pretty normal. This has always been part of the plan for our group, to be in a position like this, playing big games at home in big moments. Just another one tomorrow night.”

Just another one in front of another sellout crowd of 18,000-plus, with many more in the city of nearly a million people packing downtown in hopes of witnessing something that has not been done in nearly eight decades. Detroit in 1945 was the last team to trail 3-0 in the final and get to a Game 7, and Toronto three years before that was the only one to come all the way back.

The only way Edmonton is able to dream of that possibility now is because of McDavid, who at 42 points this postseason is just five shy of Gretzky's record set in 1985. He has emerged as the front-runner to win the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP, even if the Oilers fall short and the Panthers win the Cup for the first time in franchise history.

“He’s a reckless skilled player, which a very unique quality," Hall of Famer Ken Hitchcock, who coached McDavid in 2018-19, told The Associated Press by phone. “He’s not afraid to put his body in dangerous areas to score, and it’s really hard to defend against. He’s going to the net and taking a hit to make a play. There’s no fear in his game — none.”

Panthers coach Paul Maurice warned anyone who would listen to him coming into the series that the greatness of McDavid tends to get taken for granted because it’s such a constant. McDavid hasn’t had a ton of goals in these playoffs, or in this title series, but his impact has been off every chart.

“Here’s what happens: You get really good players, like Connor McDavid, and they get a block of time where they don’t score and there seems to be something wrong,” Maurice said. “There isn’t. Nobody, even Connor McDavid, scores at the rate in the last three games over 82 or over every playoff game or he’d have 700 points a year. That’s the way this works.”

McDavid might be reinventing how this works, putting up 11 points in Games 2-5 of the final on three goals and eight assists, despite getting the toughest defensive matchup possible opposite Aleksander Barkov, Florida's captain who won the Selke Trophy as the best defensive forward this season and earlier in the playoffs shut down Boston's David Pastrnak and New York's Artemi Panarin to get the Panthers to this point.

Being at his best when the pressure is at its highest is nothing new for McDavid. Nearly a decade ago he was the leading scorer in the Ontario Hockey League playoffs months after earning MVP honors at the world junior championship, where he led Canada to the gold medal in the building in Toronto in which he grew up going to games as a fan.

Kris Knoblauch, who took over as Oilers coach after their horrendous start had them 31st in the league out of 31 teams, knows McDavid well from their time together back then with the OHL's Erie Otters. He thinks loving the game this much is part of the three-time MVP's ability to shine when the spotlight is its brightest.

“I don’t think you can be exceptional at anything you do unless you absolutely love what you’re doing, and he loves playing hockey,” Knoblauch said. "He’s a very competitive person also. He wants to win, wants to be the best, so between his love and passion I think that just allows him to rise up and make those plays at significant times.”

Those plays have made McDavid a hero in Edmonton, where No. 97 jerseys are more common than Tim Hortons coffee shops. Asked to explain the hype, defenseman Mattias Ekholm compared McDavid to Sweden soccer icon Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

“He’s our Zlatan," Ekholm said in Swedish. "He is as big, although being a totally different kind of individual. Zlatan was outgoing and somewhat cocky and publicly self-confident. Connor is more restrained in that regard, but on the field (or in the rink), they’re the same kind of player who can take over entire games and totally dominate.

“He’s as big as you can be. I don’t know how big Gretzky was when he was playing here, but I assume it was kind of the same. He really deserves it, especially with how good he is in the really big games.”

Seventeen years since winning the Stanley Cup with Anaheim and in danger of losing in the final for the third time time in four trips since 2020, veteran winger Corey Perry likened McDavid's leadership to that to Scott Niedermayer, who was the captain of the Ducks on their title run in ‘07. It will take two more wins to follow Niedermayer’s path to the Cup and the Conn Smythe, but if anyone is able to do it, it is McDavid.

“He lets his play do the talking,” Perry said. "What Connor’s doing, he’s put this team on his back and really led by example. The guy’s on a mission, and we’re right there following him.”

AP Sports Writer Tim Reynolds in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, contributed to this report.

AP NHL playoffs: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://www.apnews.com/hub/NHL

Edmonton Oilers center Connor McDavid (97) and defenseman Darnell Nurse (25) celebrate at the end of Game 5 of the NHL hockey Stanley Cup Finals against the Florida Panthers, Tuesday, June 18, 2024, in Sunrise, Fla. The Oilers defeated the Panthers 5-3. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Edmonton Oilers players congratulate center Connor McDavid (97) after McDavid scored a goal during the third period of Game 5 of the NHL hockey Stanley Cup Finals against the Florida Panthers, Tuesday, June 18, 2024, in Sunrise, Fla. The Oilers defeated the Panthers 5-3. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Edmonton Oilers' defensive coach Paul Coffey stands with Connor McDavid (97) and Leon Draisaitl (29) during practice in Edmonton on Thursday June 20, 2024. The Edmonton Oilers take on the Florida Panthers in game 6 of the NHL Stanley Cup final on Friday. Jason Franson/The Canadian Press via AP)

Edmonton Oilers center Connor McDavid (97) skates with the puck as Florida Panthers center Kevin Stenlund (82) defends during the third period of Game 5 of the NHL hockey Stanley Cup Finals, Tuesday, June 18, 2024, in Sunrise, Fla. The Oilers defeated the Panthers 5-3. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Edmonton Oilers' Connor McDavid (97) and Mattias Ekholm (14) skate a drill during practice in Edmonton on Thursday June 20, 2024. The Edmonton Oilers take on the Florida Panthers in game 6 of the NHL Stanley Cup final on Friday. Jason Franson /The Canadian Press via AP)

Edmonton Oilers center Connor McDavid (97) celebrates his goal during the third period of Game 5 of the NHL hockey Stanley Cup Finals against the Florida Panthers, Tuesday, June 18, 2024, in Sunrise, Fla. The Oilers defeated the Panthers 5-3. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Executive branch agencies will likely have more difficulty regulating the environment, public health, workplace safety and other issues under a far-reaching decision by the Supreme Court.

The court's 6-3 ruling on Friday overturned a 1984 decision colloquially known as Chevron that has instructed lower courts to defer to federal agencies when laws passed by Congress are not crystal clear.

The 40-year-old decision has been the basis for upholding thousands of regulations by dozens of federal agencies, but has long been a target of conservatives and business groups who argue that it grants too much power to the executive branch, or what some critics call the administrative state.

The Biden administration has defended the law, warning that overturning so-called Chevron deference would be destabilizing and could bring a “convulsive shock” to the nation's legal system.

Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the court, said federal judges “must exercise their independent judgment in deciding whether an agency has acted within its statutory authority.”

The ruling does not call into question prior cases that relied on the Chevron doctrine, Roberts wrote.

Here is a look at the court's decision and the implications for government regulations going forward.

Atlantic herring fishermen sued over federal rules requiring them to pay for independent observers to monitor their catch. The fishermen argued that the 1976 Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act did not authorize officials to create industry-funded monitoring requirements and that the National Marine Fisheries Service failed to follow proper rulemaking procedure.

In two related cases, the fishermen asked the court to overturn the 40-year-old Chevron doctrine, which stems from a unanimous Supreme Court case involving the energy giant in a dispute over the Clean Air Act. That ruling said judges should defer to the executive branch when laws passed by Congress are ambiguous.

In that case, the court upheld an action by the Environmental Protection Agency under then-President Ronald Reagan.

In the decades following the ruling, Chevron has been a bedrock of modern administrative law, requiring judges to defer to agencies’ reasonable interpretations of congressional statutes.

But the current high court, with a 6-3 conservative majority has been increasingly skeptical of the powers of federal agencies. Justices Brett Kavanaugh, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch have questioned the Chevron decision. Ironically, it was Gorsuch's mother, former EPA Administrator Anne Gorsuch, who made the decision that the Supreme Court upheld in 1984.

With a closely divided Congress, presidential administrations have increasingly turned to federal regulation to implement policy changes. Federal rules impact virtually every aspect of everyday life, from the food we eat and the cars we drive to the air we breathe and homes we live in.

President Joe Biden's administration, for example, has issued a host of new regulations on the environment and other priorities, including restrictions on emissions from power plants and vehicle tailpipes, and rules on student loan forgiveness, overtime pay and affordable housing.

Those actions and others could be opened up to legal challenges if judges are allowed to discount or disregard the expertise of the executive-branch agencies that put them into place.

With billions of dollars potentially at stake, groups representing the gun industry and other businesses such as tobacco, agriculture, timber and homebuilding, were among those pressing the justices to overturn the Chevron doctrine and weaken government regulation.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce filed an amicus brief last year on behalf of business groups arguing that modern application of Chevron has “fostered aggrandizement'' of the executive branch at the expense of Congress and the courts.

David Doniger, a lawyer and longtime Natural Resources Defense Council official who argued the original Chevron case in 1984, said he feared that a ruling to overturn the doctrine could “free judges to be radical activists” who could “effectively rewrite our laws and block the protections they are supposed to provide."

“The net effect will be to weaken our government’s ability to meet the real problems the world is throwing at us — big things like COVID and climate change,″ Doniger said.

“This case was never just about fish,'' said Meredith Moore of the environmental group Ocean Conservancy. Instead, businesses and other interest groups used the herring fishery “to attack the foundations of the public agencies that serve the American public and conserve our natural resources,'' she said.

The court ruling will likely open the floodgates to litigation that could erode critical protections for people and the environment, Moore and other advocates said.

"For more than 30 years, fishery observers have successfully helped ensure that our oceans are responsibly managed so that fishing can continue in the future,'' said Dustin Cranor of Oceana, another conservation group.

He called the case "just the latest example of the far right trying to undermine the federal government’s ability to protect our oceans, waters, public lands, clean air and health.''

West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey called the decision a fitting follow-up to a 2022 decision — in a case he brought — that limits the EPA’s ability to control greenhouse gas emissions from power plants. The court held that Congress must speak with specificity when it wants to give an agency authority to regulate on an issue of major national significance.

Morrisey, now the GOP nominee for governor, called Chevron “a misguided doctrine under which courts defer to legally dubious interpretations of statutes put out by federal administrative agencies.”

The Supreme Court ruling will almost certainly shift power away from the executive branch and Congress and toward courts, said Craig Green, a professor at Temple University’s Beasley School of Law.

“Federal judges will now have the first and final word about what statutes mean,″ he said. “That’s a big shift in power.″

In what some observers see as a historic irony, many conservatives who now attack Chevron once celebrated it. The late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia was among those who hailed the original ruling as a way to rein in liberal laws.

"Conservatives believed in this rule until they didn't,'' Green said in an interview.

In recent years, conservatives have focused on "deconstruction of the administrative state,'' even if the result lessens the ability of a conservative president to impose his beliefs on government agencies.

"If you weaken the federal government, you get less government,'' Green said — an outcome that many conservatives, including those who back former President Donald Trump, welcome.

The ruling will likely “gum up the works for federal agencies and make it even harder for them to address big problems. Which is precisely what the critics of Chevron want," said Jody Freeman, director of the environmental and energy law program at Harvard Law School.

The Supreme Court building is seen on Friday, June 28, 2024, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

FILE- Gulls follow a commercial fishing boat as crewmen haul in their catch in the Gulf of Maine, in this Jan. 17, 2012 file photo. TExecutive branch agencies will likely have more difficulty regulating the environment, public health, workplace safety and other issues under a far-reaching decision by the Supreme Court. The court's 6-3 ruling on Friday overturned a 1984 decision colloquially known as Chevron that has instructed lower courts to defer to federal agencies when laws passed by Congress are not crystal clear. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty, File)