The Florida Panthers took care of business by dispatching the Boston Bruins 2-1 on Friday night, winning their second-round series in six games to advance to the Eastern Conference final for the second year in a row.
They’ll face the New York Rangers starting in Manhattan on Wednesday night.
Despite winning the Prince of Wales Trophy last year and advancing to the Stanley Cup Final for the first time since 1996, there seems to be a different vibe with this year’s team.
Everything is business-like — a different focus compared to a year ago when the Panthers eked into the playoffs and were just happy to be there.
“It’s almost a 180 in handling what we do, and it started in training camp — the focus by the group,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said.
“It’s been an unusually focused group.
It took me a while to figure that out.
I joked around a lot with the team last year.
I told a lot of semi-offside jokes. Everybody would laugh.
It was part of that culture of who we were. So I either got way less funny this year or these guys are way more serious.”
In other words, failing to finish off last year’s Cinderella run that started with a comeback from 3-1 down to upset the Bruins has given this tremendous hockey team a singular focus on bringing a Stanley Cup to South Florida for the first time since the franchise’s 1993 inception.
But first thing’s first, standing in their way will be the Presidents’ Trophy-winning Rangers, who on Thursday thwarted the Carolina Hurricanes’ attempted 3-0 series comeback with a third-period comeback behind Chris Kreider’s natural hat trick in Game 6.
The Panthers were 2-0-1 against the Rangers during the regular season.
Here are five Panthers’ storylines to watch against the Rangers.