How Panthers reached Stanley Cup Final

The Florida Panthers are in the Stanley Cup Final for the first time in 27 years.

Florida punched its ticket with a 4-3 win against the Carolina Hurricanes in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Final on Wednesday. The Panthers' only previous trip to the Final came in 1996, when they were swept in four games by the Colorado Avalanche.

Florida will play the Vegas Golden Knights in the Final. Vegas won the best-of-7 Western Conference Final with a 6-0 win against the Dallas Stars in Game 6 on Monday.

The Panthers' journey to this point has been impressive, if not surprising. In fact, it almost didn't happen.

In the final week of the regular season the Panthers' playoff hopes were flagging, and would have taken a bit hit if the Pittsburgh Penguins had beaten the Chicago Blackhawks in Pittsburgh on April 11.

RELATED: [Complete Hurricanes vs. Panthers series coverage]

Instead, the Penguins lost 5-2 to the Blackhawks and the Panthers clinched the final postseason berth in the East, one point ahead of the Penguins and Buffalo Sabres.

When the Boston Bruins opened a 3-1 lead in their best-of-7 Eastern Conference First Round series against the Panthers, it was expected. Florida squeezed into the playoffs, but Boston set NHL records for the most wins (65) and points (135) in a season.

Then everything changed.

Since that time, the Panthers have won 11 of 12 games and eliminated the teams that finished No. 1 (Bruins), No. 2 (Hurricanes, 113 points) and No. 4 (Maple Leafs, 111 points) in the NHL standings. They won the final three games against Boston; defeated Toronto in five games in the second round; then swept Carolina for the right to represent the East in the Cup Final.

Here are some of the highlights for the Panthers on the road to the Stanley Cup Final.

BEST MOMENT: It has to be Matthew Tkachuk's series winner against the Hurricanes with 4.9 seconds remaining in the third period of Game 4 at FLA Live Arena. With the clock clicking down, the forward showed poise and patience in waiting for Carolina goalie Frederik Andersen to go down before flipping the puck into the net.

TURNING POINT: The clock appeared to have struck midnight on the Cinderella Panthers when they trailed the Bruins 3-2 late in Game 7 of the first round on April 30. Against a defensively stingy team like Boston, the odds were against Florida. Enter defenseman Brandon Montour, who tied the game with 1:00 remaining in the third to extend the Panthers' season to overtime, when forward Carter Verhaeghe won it at 8:35. Without Montour's goal, there likely would have been no OT, The Bruins most assuredly would have advanced, and we might be talking about them being back in the Final. We aren't, and that's because of Montour.

BEST MOVES MADE: The Panthers' offseason moves are paying huge dividends, notably the hiring of coach Paul Maurice and the trade for Tkachuk. Maurice had walked away from his position as coach of the Winnipeg Jets on Dec. 17, 2021, and had no aspirations to step back behind a bench until general manager Bill Zito convinced him otherwise during a phone conversation in June. Then on July 22, 2022, the Panthers acquired Tkachuk from the Calgary Flames in a trade for forward Jonathan Huberdeau, defenseman MacKenzie Weegar, forward prospect Video: Montour, Verhaeghe lift Panthers to Game 7 OT win and a conditional first-round pick in the 2025 NHL Draft. Ten months later, those two have been key in the Panthers reaching the Final.

BEST MOVES NOT MADE: Maurice could have benched Sergei Bobrovsky after the goalie allowed five goals in a 6-2 loss to the Bruins in Game 4 of the first round. There was precedent; Alex Lyon had started the final eight games of the regular season, when the Panthers went 6-1-1, and the first three games of the first round. But give Maurice credit for sticking with Bobrovsky. That loss to the Bruins now looks like a distant blip on the radar; Bobrovsky has a .942 save percentage in 12 games since then. Sometimes, the best goalie change is the one you don't make.

SIGNATURE WIN (REGULAR SEASON): The Panthers ended a four-game losing streak with a 3-2 overtime victory at the Maple Leafs on March 29. That started a 6-1-1 run to end the season and put them in the right mindset for the playoffs. Forward Sam Reinhart scored the tying goal at 19:00 of the third, then Montour won it at 1:41 of overtime. Had they not come back to win that game, there's a good chance we wouldn't be talking (or writing) about Florida in the Cup Final.

SIGNATURE WIN (PLAYOFFS): The Panthers haven't just had their backs against the wall the past two months, they've been holding the thing up. Time after time Florida's never-say-die attitude has been front and center. That never was more evident than in their 3-2 victory in quadruple overtime against the Hurricanes in Game 1 of the conference final, the sixth-longest game in NHL history. Just when it appeared the game was heading to a fifth overtime period, Tkachuk scored the winner 13 seconds remaining. The Panthers are 6-0 in overtime games in this postseason, and no victory was more reflective of their resiliency than that one.

MVP: It would be either Tkachuk or Bobrovsky without a doubt. And with apologies to the Stars and the Golden Knights, these two should be the clear frontrunners for the Conn Smythe Trophy, awarded to the most valuable player of the postseason. Tkachuk is second among all players in the playoffs with 21 points (nine goals, 12 assists). His sense of the dramatic has been ridiculous: he scored the overtime goal that eliminated the Bruins in Game 7, then scored three game-winners against the Hurricanes. That's the definition of a difference maker. The same goes for Bobrovsky, who is 11-2 with a 2.21 goals-against average and .935 save percentage in 14 playoff games. Florida has been outshot in 12 of its 16 postseason games, but the goalie has given them a chance on most nights. They've made the most of that.

BIGGEST SURPRISE: This is an easy one since almost no one saw Bobrovsky's dominant postseason coming. There's a reason Lyon entered the playoffs as the starter; Bobrovsky was 24-20-3 in 49 games during the regular season, and his 3.07 GAA ranked him 27th among the 42 NHL goalies who played at least 30 games. But for Bobrovsky and the Panthers, that must seem like a lifetime ago.