SUNRISE, Fla. --The Florida Panthers are one victory from reaching the Stanley Cup Final.
After winning the first three games of the Eastern Conference Final, the team with the fewest points to reach the Stanley Cup Playoffs this season is on the verge of playing for the championship.
It's not all him of course. But Bobrovsky has allowed three goals in three games, including a shutout in Game 3, as the Panthers have taken control of the series.
Teams that hold a 3-0 lead in a best-of-7 playoff series are 200-4 (.980), 46-0 (1.000) in the round before the Final.
Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad, the No. 1 pick in the 2014 NHL Draft, has been anticipating this moment for nearly a decade.
"Waiting, working to get here, to get this opportunity," he said. "It's been a long time coming. So for us, for [our fans], it's huge. It's exciting."
But the Hurricanes aren't ready to give up yet. They're going to be doing everything they can to bring the series back to Raleigh, North Carolina, for Game 5 on Friday.
"Our backs are against the wall," forward Sebastian Aho said. "We've got to come out desperate and put all we got out there.
"We've been losing, but it's not like they dominated us. It's there for us. Obviously all we think about is to win a hockey game tonight."
Here are 3 keys to Game 4:
1. Scoring up a storm
The primary reason the Hurricanes trail 3-0 is they can't score.
They scored two goals in Game 1, one in Game 2 and were shut out in Game 3. They haven't been able to solve Bobrovsky despite outshooting the Panthers in all three games, including 32-17 in Game 3.
"We've got to score some goals or you're not going to win a game," Carolina coach Rod Brind'Amour said. "We're doing all we can on the other side of things. It's just, we've got to find a way to break through and then maybe get a little confidence going that way and who knows what can happen.
"But that's obviously the game plan."
2. Barkov is back
Panthers captain Aleksander Barkov, who left Game 3 with 7:04 remaining in the first period because of a lower-body injury, will play after taking part in the morning skate.
"Ready to roll," Florida coach Paul Maurice said. "Freshest guy on the ice."
Barkov is a crucial piece for the Panthers, someone who plays in every situation and who helps make them go.
He has 12 points (four goals, eight assists) in 15 games in the playoffs, including three points (two goals, one assist) in the first three games of this series.
3. Learn from the past
The Panthers have seen their opponents put up strong Game 4 performances in the past two series, with the Boston Bruins defeating them 6-2 to go up 3-1 in the Eastern Conference First Round and the Toronto Maple Leafs defeating them 2-1 to avoid a sweep in the second round.
"This will be our third Game 4," Maurice said. "Because we start on the road in each series, I felt that Game 4 was Boston's best game of the series. It was also Toronto's best game of the series. Now, different context. … I think we learned some things in those Games 4. Because it got us in the right direction in Boston and we learned some things that will be important for tonight in that Game 4 against Toronto. We would expect [the Hurricanes] to be as strong as they possibly can be for the entire game."
