The Florida Panthers are on the verge of a historic NHL achievement. The Cats beat the Carolina Hurricanes 5-3 in Game 5 of the Eastern Conference final on Wednesday, May 28. They have now made it to the Stanley Cup Final for the third consecutive year and are aiming to join a short and elite list of franchises to have won back-to-back championships.
Since 1918, only 10 NHL teams have managed to win back-to-back Stanley Cups a total of 27 times. The last franchise to do so was the Tampa Bay Lightning, who secured consecutive titles in 2019-20 and 2020-21.
NHL Teams With Consecutive Stanley Cup Wins
Teams With 5 Consecutive Stanley Cups
- Montreal Canadiens (1956-60)
The Montreal Canadiens hold the record for the most consecutive Stanley Cup wins, capturing five straight championships from the 1955-56 season through the 1959-60 season.
Teams With 4 Consecutive Stanley Cups
- Montreal Canadiens (1976-79)
- New York Islanders (1980-83)
Two teams have won four consecutive Stanley Cups: the Habs in the late 1970s, and the New York Islanders had their own four-year streak starting in the 1979-80 season.
Teams With 3 Consecutive Stanley Cups
- Toronto Maple Leafs (1947-49; 1962-64)
The Maple Leafs are the only franchise to have achieved the three-peat on two separate occasions: First in the late 1940s and again in the early 1960s.
Teams With 2 Consecutive Stanley Cups
- Detroit Red Wings (1936-37; 1954-55; 1997-98)
- Montreal Canadiens (1930-31; 1965-66; 1968-69)
- Edmonton Oilers (1984-85; 1987-88)
- Pittsburgh Penguins (1991-92; 2016-17)
- Philadelphia Flyers (1974-75)
- St. Louis Eagles (1920-21)
- Tampa Bay Lightning (2020-21)
Several franchises have managed to win two Stanley Cups in a row, with some achieving this feat multiple times. The Habs and Red Wings have multiple two-year streaks. The Oilers and Penguins also achieved this feat twice in their histories. The defunct St. Louis Eagles also achieved the feat in the ’20s.
Florida Panthers’ Road to the 2025 Stanley Cup Final
With their series win over the Canes, the Panthers become the ninth franchise in NHL history to reach three consecutive Stanley Cup Final, with the Tampa Bay Lightning being the most recent to do so from 2020-22.
BACK-TO-BACK-TO-BACK pic.twitter.com/j0pDDHrDOt
— x – Florida Panthers (@FlaPanthers) May 29, 2025
Florida finished the regular season as the Atlantic Division’s No. 3 seed, eliminated the Lightning in five games, and overcame the Division champions, the Toronto Maple Leafs, in a thrilling seven-game second-round series, overturning a 2-0 deficit.
In the Eastern Conference final, the Panthers defeated the Carolina Hurricanes in five games. The team went 2-0 down on the night but rallied with three second-period goals and sealed the win with an empty-netter to secure their third straight Final appearance.
“We didn’t come here to win the Eastern Conference,” Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov said via NHL.com. “I’m not saying anything bad about it, but we got where we wanted; we’re in the Final once again, and we want to win the Stanley Cup just like any other team.
