The Florida Panthers roared into hockey history Tuesday night, dominating the Edmonton Oilers 5-1 in Game 6 to clinch their second straight Stanley Cup title. With the win, Florida becomes the NHL’s first back-to-back champion since Tampa Bay in 2020 and ’21 — and only the third team this century to pull off the feat.
Sam Reinhart was simply unstoppable, lighting the lamp four times and joining an elite club as just the sixth player ever — and the first since Maurice Richard in 1957 — to score four goals in a Cup Final game. His hat trick unleashed a blizzard of hats—and plastic rats— onto the ice, a nod to Florida’s iconic playoff tradition.
Matthew Tkachuk, the fiery heartbeat of the franchise, put the final nail in the Oilers’ coffin with the Cup-clinching goal, while goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky turned away 28 of 29 shots to silence Edmonton’s hopes of revenge. The Oilers’ lone tally came in meaningless garbage time, courtesy of Vasily Podkolzin.
Canada’s Cup drought stretched to 31 seasons and 32 years, with no team north of the border lifting the trophy since Montreal in 1993. Meanwhile, Sun Belt supremacy continues: five of the last six Cups now reside in the southern U.S., with Florida alone hoisting it twice in a row.
