Shock as Bruins, Avalanche crash out
The team that had a record regular season and the defending champions have both crashed out of the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs. The Boston Bruins are done, with a long off-season to think about their failure to capitalise on the greatest regular season in NHL history. The Florida Panthers are moving on, thrown right into their second-round series against the Toronto Maple Leafs beginning Tuesday night. “Game 7. Overtime win. Against pretty much the best team in regular-season history. It’s unreal,” Panthers centre Aleksander Barkov said after Florida beat Boston 4-3 in overtime to eliminate the record-setting Bruins from the playoffs. “For sure it’s up there, and it's hard to understand right now. I don’t think we need to understand right now. We’ll understand later.” Brandon Montour tied it with 1 minute left in regulation, and Carter Verhaeghe scored the game-winner at 8:35 of overtime. The Panthers won three straight after falling behind 3-1 in the best-of-seven series. Boston, the Presidents' Trophy winners with NHL records of 65 wins and 135 points, had not lost three in a row all season. Sergei Bobrovsky made 33 saves for Florida, which advanced in the postseason for just the second time since reaching the Stanley Cup Final in 1996.  “I don’t think you can find a harder team to play against than the Boston Bruins. They will test you,” said Florida coach Paul Maurice, who improved to 4-0 in Game 7’s in his career. “The players here now have a shared experience of what hard is... It will make us better for five years. That’s how hard it was.” Jeremy Swayman, making his first start of the series for Boston as a sub for likely Vezina Trophy winner Linus Ullmark, stopped 27 shots. The game could be the last for Bruins captain Patrice Bergeron, who teased retirement last year but opted to return. He was the last Boston player on the ice, leaving after a stick-wave to the crowd and one last hug with Brad Marchand. In Denver, Oliver Bjorkstrand scored twice, Philipp Grubauer was stellar in stopping 33 shots and the Seattle Kraken eliminated the defending Stanley Cup champions Colorado Avalanche with a 2-1 win in Game 7. Bjorkstrand scored one goal on a fortuitous deflection – the puck hit off a stick and glove – and another with a liner past goaltender Alexandar Georgiev that clanged off the post. Seattle grabbed the lead in every game in the series. Next up for the second-year Kraken is a second-round series against the Stars that opens in Dallas on Tuesday night.  Seattle was 1-1-1 against Dallas in the regular season. Mikko Rantanen was credited with a power-play goal for Colorado after a shot by Nathan MacKinnon clipped him and went in. MacKinnon appeared to score early in the third period to tie it at 2, but Seattle challenged the play and the goal was disallowed due to Colorado being offside. The Avalanche pulled Georgiev with under 2 minutes remaining but couldn't get the equaliser. It allowed the Kraken to accomplish another franchise first, a series-clinching celebration. (AP)