1994 Stanley Cup Finals

The 1994 Stanley Cup Finals was the championship series of the National Hockey League's (NHL) 1993–94 season, and the culmination of the 1994 Stanley Cup playoffs. It was contested between the Eastern Conference champion New York Rangers and Western Conference champion Vancouver Canucks. The Canucks were making the club's second Finals appearance, their first coming during their Cinderella run of, and the Rangers were making their tenth appearance, their first since. The Rangers, despite losing a 3-1 series lead, ended their then record 54-year championship drought with a victory in Game 7 to claim the long-awaited Stanley Cup. It was their fourth championship in franchise history.

The CBC broadcast of the deciding game seven attracted an average Canadian audience of 4.957 million viewers, making it the most watched CBC Sports program in history to that time. This was the last Stanley Cup Finals with games played in Canada until, and the last to go the full seven games until.

The Rangers’ victory marked the start of what is currently thirty consecutive victories in the Stanley Cup Finals for American-based teams, as the most recent Canadian team to win the Stanley Cup were the Montreal Canadiens in the previous season.

Vancouver Canucks
The Canucks entered the playoffs seeded seventh in the Western Conference, and overcame a three-games-to-one deficit against the second-seeded Calgary Flames, winning the final three games in overtime with Game 7 ending in double overtime as Pavel Bure scored the winning goal on a breakaway to upset the Flames. They then upset the fourth-seeded Dallas Stars in the second round in five games. In the Conference Finals, the Canucks upset the third-seeded Toronto Maple Leafs in five games to capture their second Western Conference title. This was the Canucks’ first appearance in the Stanley Cup Finals since 1982, where they were previously swept by the Rangers’ cross-town rivals in the New York Islanders.

New York Rangers
The Rangers entered the playoffs with the league's best record, then swept their New York-area rival New York Islanders and then beat the Washington Capitals in five games, before falling behind three games to two in the Eastern Conference Finals against their Hudson River rivals, New Jersey Devils. They then won Game 6 by a 4–2 score after team captain Mark Messier publicly guaranteed a victory and then scored a third-period hat trick. The Rangers then won Game 7 by a 2–1 score on Stéphane Matteau's goal in double overtime, prompting the call of "Matteau, Matteau, Matteau!" by Rangers radio announcer Howie Rose. It was Matteau's second double overtime goal of the series.

Game summaries
This series brought together two assistant coaches who were teammates on the other Canucks team to reach the Finals: Rangers assistant coach Colin Campbell and Canucks assistant coach Stan Smyl, who served as team captain then, as Kevin McCarthy was injured.

It was the second straight Finals that featured a former Edmonton Oilers captain trying to become the first person to win a Stanley Cup as captain on two different teams. The previous year, Wayne Gretzky, who captained the Oilers to the first four of their five Stanley Cups in the 1980s, captained the Los Angeles Kings to the finals, which they lost to the Montreal Canadiens. Here, it was Mark Messier of the Rangers, who captained the Oilers to the last of their five, in.

The Rangers players had a decided edge in Finals experience, with seven players from the 1990 Oilers, including Messier, Glenn Anderson, Jeff Beukeboom, Adam Graves, Kevin Lowe, Craig MacTavish, and Esa Tikkanen. One 1990 Oiler, Martin Gelinas, was playing for the Canucks. Overall, the Rangers had eleven players with previous Finals appearances, compared to the Canucks' five. In addition, three of the Rangers (Messier, Anderson, and Lowe) were each making their seventh appearance in the Stanley Cup Finals (each having made their first six with Edmonton).

With the Rangers having 112 points in the regular-season standing and the Canucks 85, the 27-point difference was the largest point differential between two teams in the Stanley Cup Finals since 1982, when there was a 41-point difference between the New York Islanders (118) and the Canucks (77).

Game 1
The Rangers scored early and led 2–1 late in the third period before Martin Gélinas tied the game with 1:00 to play in regulation time. It was the third time in eight games that the Rangers had surrendered a last-minute tying goal. The Rangers were all over the Canucks in overtime, but goaltender Kirk McLean made 52 saves on the night. In the last minute of the first overtime, Brian Leetch hit the crossbar at one end, and the Canucks went down to score the winner at the other on an odd-man rush by Greg Adams, as the Rangers, once again, lost a series opener at home in overtime.

Game 2
The Rangers evened the series with a 3–1 victory before the series shifted west.

Game 3
The Canucks came storming out in front of their home fans and Pavel Bure scored on his first shift to give them the early lead. But late in the period, with the score tied 1–1, Bure hit Jay Wells in the face with his stick and cut him, leading to a major penalty and Bure's expulsion from the game. Alexei Kovalev scored a breakaway shorthanded goal, which was featured on the cover of NHL 95. Glenn Anderson scored on the ensuing power-play and the Rangers then cruised to a 5–1 victory.

Game 4
In the fourth game, the Canucks again jumped out to an early lead, this time 2–0, before Mike Richter and Brian Leetch took over the game. Richter made some key saves to keep the game within reach, including one on a penalty shot against Pavel Bure, and Leetch picked up a goal and three assists as the Rangers won 4–2 to take a commanding 3–1 series lead.

Game 5
Most who entered Madison Square Garden for the fifth game thought they were going to see the Rangers win the Cup that night. New York had already set the date for a victory parade. However, the celebration plans got ahead of the work at hand. The Canucks were leading 3–0 by the third minute of the third period. Even though the Rangers scrambled to pull even by the midway point, Vancouver took the lead 29 seconds later on a goal by Dave Babych and cruised to a 6–3 win.

Game 6
The Canucks fired 14 shots at Mike Richter in the first period and led 1–0 on a Jeff Brown bullet from the point. The score was 2–1 after two periods before another Brown goal gave the Canucks a 3–1 third-period lead. Late in the third, Geoff Courtnall appeared to score for the Canucks, but the play continued and the Rangers scored to temporarily make the score 3–2. But, in the ensuing video review, it was confirmed that Courtnall had indeed scored his second goal of the game to clinch the game for the Canucks and force a seventh game, the first in the finals since 1987.

Game 7
For the second time since and the tenth time overall, the Finals went to seven games. Rangers coach Mike Keenan became the first person to be a head coach in game sevens of the Stanley Cup Finals for two different teams. Keenan had coached the Philadelphia Flyers in when they lost to the Edmonton Oilers. Mike Babcock would join him in this feat in while with the Detroit Red Wings, having been with the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim when they lost to the New Jersey Devils in  (the home team won all seven games of the series).

The game at Madison Square Garden was an "electric affair" with the Rangers jumping to an early 2–0 lead at the 15-minute mark after scoring twice within four minutes on goals by Brian Leetch and Adam Graves. However, Canucks captain Trevor Linden silenced the home crowd with a short-handed goal early in the second period to make it 2-1. Mark Messier restored order for the home crowd with a power play goal, only to have Linden make it close again. After that, it was "hectic, jittery hockey," Nathan LaFayette "frightened all Manhattan wobbling a loose puck" off the post behind Mike Richter with six minutes left. There were three face-offs in the Rangers' zone in the final 37 seconds, the last coming with 1.6 seconds on the clock.

Mark Messier provided two of the most memorable images of that Stanley Cup Finals that would become iconic images to the Rangers and their fans: first, jumping up and down excitedly as ticker tape fell, then, showing incredible emotion as he accepted the Stanley Cup from NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman, as he became the first (and, the only) player to captain two different teams to the Stanley Cup. At the time Messier was credited for the game-winning goal earning him the tongue-in-cheek nickname of "Mr. June"; however, Messier admitted in 2017 that the game-winning goal was likely scored by Brian Noonan.

Television
In Canada, the series was televised in English on the CBC and in French on SRC. In the United States, the series was broadcast on ESPN outside of the New York City market. The local rightsholder, MSG Network broadcast games one, two, three, six, and seven on its main channel, and games four and five on its secondary MSG 2 channel, due to conflicts with the Yankees schedule.

This was the last Cup Finals in which the regional rights holders of the participating U.S. teams produced local telecasts of their respective games. This was also the last Cup Finals to air exclusively on a cable network until, when TNT aired the Finals for the first time ever. Under the American TV contracts that would take effect beginning next season, there would be exclusive national coverage of the Cup Finals, split between Fox Sports and ESPN.

ESPN also sent its broadcasts to a record 120 countries, for a potential audience of 285 million. MSG Network broadcaster Al Trautwig said that the Rangers themselves contributed to those numbers in putting the first Russian names on the Stanley Cup: Alexander Karpovtsev, Alexei Kovalev, Sergei Nemchinov, and Sergei Zubov, giving a huge European audience, including those watching on the brand-new television screens across the former Soviet Union, a Stanley Cup story to remember.

Ratings
In the United States, game seven was the highest-rated hockey game on cable. ESPN's broadcast drew a 5.2 rating. However, in New York, the ESPN blackout meant MSG Network's broadcast drew 16.2 rating, a record for the network. The two networks combined yielded a 6.9 rating.

With an average Canadian audience of 4.957 million viewers, game seven was the most watched CBC Sports program until the 10.6 million viewers for the men's ice hockey gold medal game between Canada and the United States at the 2002 Winter Olympics, when Canada won its first Olympic ice hockey gold medal since the 1952 Winter Olympics. Bob Cole, who called both games, said that game seven was one of his most memorable TV games.

Team rosters
Bolded years under Finals appearance indicates a year the player won the Stanley Cup.

Stanley Cup engraving
The 1994 Stanley Cup was presented to Rangers captain Mark Messier by NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman following the Rangers 3–2 win over the Canucks in game seven.

The following Rangers players and staff had their names engraved on the Stanley Cup.

1993–94 New York Rangers