‘What we went through is miraculous’: Panthers reflect on run, long for more after losing

The Vegas Golden Knights celebrated on one end of the ice and Florida Panthers slowly trickled off their bench to gather around the opposite goal line. They stopped to embrace Sergei Bobrovsky and Aleksander Barkov glided from teammate to teammate to give each of them a final message before they all left the ice, and then they all stopped and turned toward the Golden Knights’ celebration.

They listened to the Las Vegas crowd roar and, almost to a man, kept their eyes fixed on the mass of Golden Knights piled up on the ice at T-Mobile Arena to celebrate their first championship. The Panthers had gotten so close and, in the end, nowhere close at all. A 9-3 rout brought an end to one of the most incredible runs in the history of the Stanley Cup playoffs and they could not help but think about what could have been.

“We’ll find a way to get ourselves back in this position,” star defenseman Aaron Ekblad said Tuesday. “There’s no doubt in my mind.”

Panthers’ dream run ends with blowout loss, Tkachuk hurt and Vegas lifting the Stanley Cup

Ekblad — with his beard as thick and full as it had ever been, propped up with help of a broken foot and torn oblique muscle — was in South Florida for the bad days, when losses were far more frequent than wins and trips to the Cup playoffs were the ultimate prize. As much as the blowout loss in Game 5 of the 2023 Stanley Cup Final stung, the 27-year-old Canadian was not afraid to reminisce, even in the immediate aftermath.

The run was improbable — the Panthers kept saying it over and over throughout the 2023 Stanley Cup playoffs — and could change the franchise for years to come.

By some measures, this was the best season in club history. By most, it’s the best stretch Florida has ever had. To go from the lowest seeded team in the playoffs all the way to the Stanley Cup Final was too special to just ignore.

“You can appreciate it now. What we went through is miraculous,” Ekblad said. “The way some guys played and collectively as a team the way we played was pretty incredible. There’s a lot to look at positively and there’s a lot to learn from this series, and, ultimately, we just didn’t get the job done here.”

In the end, the Cup Final wasn’t particularly close. Vegas won Games 1 and 2 at home, only lost Game 3 in overtime in Sunrise after superstar right wing Matthew Tkachuk scored a game-tying goal with 2:13 left in the third period, then bounced back to win Game 4 at FLA Live Arena and blow out the Panthers in Game 5. The Golden Knights outscored Florida by 15 goals in the championship series and finished the postseason with a plus-31 goal differential.

Injuries certainly played a role. Tkachuk fractured his sternum in Game 3 before he scored his game-tying goal, tried to play through pain in Game 4 and finally sat out Game 5 once the pain became so unbearable. Ekblad broke a foot in Round 1, twice dislocated his shoulder and tore an oblique. Defenseman Radko Gudas was playing through a high ankle sprain and center Sam Bennett at one point in Round 2 couldn’t take off his own shoulder pads because of an injury. Forward Eetu Luostarinen didn’t play at all in the Final and four Panthers broke bones during the run, coach Paul Maurice said Tuesday.

The pain, by the end of the run, was quite literal, just as it was figurative.

“This is one of the top four or five bad days of your life when you lose in the Stanley Cup,” Maurice said, “but even now standing here, I love those guys. They gave me a great year of my life.”

Florida Panthers’ Stanley Cup dream, sweet playoff run end in brutal 9-3 loss as Vegas reigns | Opinion

It was, at first, a challenging year. Florida was the defending Presidents’ Trophy winner and yet wound up nine points out of a postseason spot after Christmas, only sneaking into the playoffs in the final week of the regular season.

Once spring arrived, it became a thrilling one. The Panthers lost 3 of 4 to the Presidents’ Trophy-winning Bruins to start the first round, then stormed back with three straight wins to upset Boston, which set regular-season records for points and wins, and they were off. They beat the Maple Leafs in five games in the second round and swept the Hurricanes in the Eastern Conference finals to make the Final for only the second time in franchise history, and the first time since they made the 1996 Stanley Cup Final in only their third season of existence.

Their trip through the playoffs pitted them against four of the five best teams in the league, in terms of regular-season record, and Florida still got closer to hoisting the Cup than ever before.

“I don’t know how many people in the hockey world expected us or thought we were going to be in this situation,” star defenseman Brandon Montour said Tuesday. “This organization has grown dramatically over the last couple years and I think the hockey world knows now that we’re for real.”

The injuries, Maurice cautioned, will make next season challenging for the Panthers. Multiple players, he said, will require surgery and could miss 4-6 months, which could keep them out for several months to start the 2023-24 NHL season.

His players will not use it as an excuse. Florida got a taste of glory this year and came tantalizingly close to the ultimate goal. The Panthers felt they could’ve been the ones hoisting the Cup this month if a few things had gone differently and believe the lessons they took from this run will only make them stronger.

All but five players from the active roster Tuesday are still under contract for next year. Florida will have about $10 million in cap space to work with as dead cap space from buying out former defenseman Keith Yandle in 2021 drops precipitously. The Panthers have financial flexibility to add reinforcements through free agency or trades.

The core is intact — none of Florida’s pending free agents are top-nine forwards or top-pairing defensemen — and following up a Presidents’ Trophy with a run to a Final is reason to believe the last few months were no fluke.

“It’s huge. There’s not stopping now,” Ekblad said. “There’s no stopping here, so a bump in the road and it’s going to sting. It stings now. We’ll find a way to come back next year and be stronger because of it. How could you not going through what we went through this year?”