Panthers beat Leafs in OT, reach first East finals since 1996

TORONTO

The scenes played out the same as they did not even two weeks earlier: The Florida Panthers were celebrating. The crowd was shell-shocked. An upset — once inconceivable — was complete.

The Panthers, for the second time in two weeks, knocked out a Stanley Cup contender on their home ice, and did with the sort of theatrics and abruptness only overtime in the Stanley Cup playoffs can provide. Nick Cousins scored in transition, on a play set up by Radko Gudas, and Florida stunned the Toronto Maple Leafs, 3-2, in overtime of Game 5 on Friday in Canada to advance to the Eastern Conference finals.

“Nobody in the world thought we were going to be in this position right now,” superstar right wing Matthew Tkachuk said. “We don’t care what anybody’s opinion is.”

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The Maple Leafs, who finished the regular season with the fourth best record in the league, are going home after just have games in the second round, just as the Presidents’ Trophy winning Bruins did last week after seven games in Round 1. The Panthers, who made the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs by one point and didn’t clinch their spot until the last week of the regular season, are four wins away from the Stanley Cup Finals.

They’ll travel to face the Hurricanes in Raleigh, North Carolina, sometime next week. They weren’t ready to start thinking about it Friday, though. Their 4-1 series victory in Toronto was an accomplishment already, especially for this franchise.

Florida is going to the NHL Conference Finals for the first time since the 1996 Stanley Cup playoffs — only its third season of existence. The Panthers hadn’t even won a game in Round 2 since then and hadn’t beaten a team with more than 100 regular-season points since those Cup playoffs, either. Now, they’ve done it twice in a row by winning 7 of 8 to put together a historic comeback in the first round and dismantle another elite team in the second.

“It’s huge for the franchise,” Cousins said.

It took contributions from all across the roster. Cousins’ goal was only his second of the series, as was Gudas’ assist. Star defenseman Aaron Ekblad and left wing Carter Verhaeghe tied Florida to an early 2-0 lead by each scoring in the first period — and assisting on the other’s goal. Star goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky did most of the rest, stopping 50 of 52 shots for only the second 50-save performance in Panthers postseason history.

Toronto averaged 3.41 goals per game in the regular season and Florida held them to just 10 in this series — two in every single game.

“It’s amazing,” Bobrovsky said. “The guys did a great job. They cleaned up in front of the net very well, they blocked shot at the right time, they allowed me to see the puck and control the puck. We’re definitely in this together and it’s fun to be part of this locker room.”

Less than a month ago, a run like this would’ve been almost unimaginable. Now, there’s nothing surprising about the way they’re playing.

No matter how it feels, it wasn’t long ago the Panthers were unlikely to even make the playoffs, nine points out of a postseason spot after Christmas and not even locked into a wild card until after their penultimate game in the regular season.

At the same time, it also wasn’t so long ago they were unquestionably one of the best teams in the NHL, winning the Presidents’ Trophy last year and going into this season on the short list of favorites in the East. They began their season with their eyes on a run like this one, hiring a new coach and trading away two of their best players in the offseason to get Tkachuk, and try to set it up.

The path was hard and the changes nearly left Florida out of the postseason entirely. It also left the Panthers hardened and let them win a game like this.

After Florida scored twice in the first period, the Maple Leafs started to chip away. Morgan Rielly cut the Panthers’ lead to 2-1 with 12:10 left in the second period and briefly thought he had the game tied later in the period, but Florida got the game to overtime thanks to 41 regulation saves by Bobrovsky, including one which came centimeters from crossing the line.

With 2:50 left in the second, the Panthers lost track of Rielly and the star defenseman barreled to the net uncovered. He jammed the puck into Bobrovsky’s right leg pad and started to celebrate, even though there was no goal signal from the officials. The 34-year-old goalie held firm on the shot to keep it out of the goal and a replay review confirmed it.

It led to an ugly moment: One angle showed the puck across the line, only it happened after the whistle was blown, but none of the 19,513 inside Scotiabank Arena could know, so some of them started pelting the ice with garbage after the officials made the final call.

It did not kill the comeback bid, though. Star winger William Nylander scored in transition with 4:26 left in the third period and the game went to overtime tied at 2-2.

In the extra period, Florida had 13 scoring chances and six high-danger chances, and finally scored on the last one.

By the time Cousins’ phone stopped buzzing, he had 108 text messages to sift through. When Bobrovsky finally emerged from the locker room, a group from the Panthers’ management team gave him a round of applause. This was a hard journey for Florida and, even though it’s not over yet, this was an accomplishment worth celebrating.

“I get to watch a bunch of guys that you care about a lot and enjoy the hell out of it. You walk into the room after, it’s pure joy in there,” coach Paul Maurice said. “They just love being together. It’s fun. … It’s fun to be associated with it.”

This story was originally published May 12, 2023 10:39 PM.