Brad Marchand Reunites with Stanley Cup After 14 Years, Fuels Panthers' Back-to-Back Triumph
After a 14-year wait, Brad Marchand finally embraced the moment again—hoisting and kissing the Stanley Cup as the Florida Panthers clinched Game 6 against the Edmonton Oilers with a decisive 5-1 victory, locking in their second consecutive championship on Tuesday night.
"It hits completely differently this time," Marchand said with emotion. "There's so much more respect and appreciation for how insanely hard it is to reach this point. Everything has to align perfectly." The 37-year-old veteran, who lifted the Cup with the Boston Bruins in 2011, added, "Honestly, I shouldn’t have even been here. But somehow, it all worked out."
Marchand was a major sparkplug behind the Panthers' championship run, registering 10 goals and 10 assists across 23 games and posting a +17 rating alongside linemates Anton Lundell and Eetu Luostarinen. Though he didn’t find the net in Game 6, he still notched 6 goals in 6 Final games, including two clutch game-winners.
"He's always shown up in the biggest moments. Back in 2011, you could argue he was our best player," said Shawn Thornton, a former Bruins teammate turned Panthers executive. "Honestly, his age doesn’t even register when you see the way he competes."
After 16 seasons in Boston, Marchand was dealt to Florida at the NHL trade deadline due to a contract stalemate. The twist? The Panthers had eliminated the Bruins in both the 2023 and 2024 playoffs. Adding to the drama, last postseason Sam Bennett injured Marchand with a sucker punch. But on Tuesday night, they skated the Cup as teammates.
"The second he was traded here, he lit up the group chat—chirping me instantly about our past battles," Bennett, now crowned Conn Smythe Trophy winner as playoff MVP, recalled with a grin.
"What Marchy brought to this team... we don’t win this without him. His leadership, his relentless drive, it was contagious," Bennett added. "Every night, I told him, ‘We’re riding with you.’ And we did. The guy’s a warrior. He easily could’ve won this trophy himself."
Marchand, now a locker room cornerstone, said the brotherhood within the Panthers made the transition seamless.
"It just proves that when you become part of a team like this, with a culture like this, bonds form fast," he said. "The environment here is unreal. They welcomed us new guys like family."
Florida GM Bill Zito praised Marchand’s impact off the ice just as much as his heroics on it.
"I’ve been telling people—it’s not just what he does during games. It’s what he does in the locker room. He blended in so fast, you wouldn’t know he was the ‘new guy.’ That says everything about who he is."
Case in point: the Panthers' long-standing tradition of fans tossing plastic rats on the ice after wins. In these playoffs, players jokingly pelted Marchand with the rats as they left the ice. Even during Tuesday’s celebration, Sam Reinhart—who scored four goals in the clincher—playfully chucked a rat at Marchand as he kissed the Cup.
"It still felt heavy!" Marchand joked. "But doing this at home, surrounded by people I love who helped get me here? It’s an unbelievable feeling."
Now an unrestricted free agent, Marchand’s future remains uncertain. But after one of the finest playoff runs of his career, there's no doubt teams will be lining up for him.
Meanwhile, the Panthers sealed the series with two straight dominant wins, built on fast starts and relentless defense.
The scoring frenzy began just 4:36 into the first period, thanks to a magical solo effort by Sam Reinhart. Oilers’ defenseman Evan Bouchard turned over the puck near the blue line, and Reinhart twisted Mattias Ekholm inside out before slipping the puck past Stuart Skinner, who returned as starter after being benched in Game 5.
Before the first intermission, Matthew Tkachuk made it 2-0, sniping his 8th goal of the postseason through a screen by Lundell. The Panthers had now scored 2+ goals in the opening frame of all six games and completely shut out the Oilers in first periods of the final four games.
In the second, goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky made 10 saves, anchoring the defense. At 17:31, Reinhart scored again off a loose rebound by Skinner, assisted by Aleksander Barkov, pushing the lead to 3-0.
The third period saw Reinhart complete his hat trick with an empty-netter at 13:26. Just 1:29 later, he buried a fourth goal into another vacant net, capping an 11-goal postseason performance.
As the final seconds expired, the bench erupted, players leaping over the boards in jubilation. The Panthers became the first team since the 1977–78 Montreal Canadiens to repeat as Stanley Cup champions by defeating the same opponent in consecutive years.
So, are they a dynasty now?
“Hell, yeah,” Tkachuk roared. “Absolutely.”