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Latest news on the Stanley Cup, NHL playoffs and the Stanley Cup Final, covering the playoff bracket, schedule, scores, matchups, series results, Stanley Cup odds, Game 7 drama, conference finals, wild card races, the Conn Smythe Trophy, Stanley Cup finals history, Stanley Cup winners, the most Stanley Cups and championship contenders.

The Stanley Cup is the National Hockey League's championship trophy and one of the oldest prizes in North American professional sport. It goes to the winner of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, a four-round knockout that starts with 16 of the league's 32 clubs: the top three in each division plus two wild cards per conference. Every series is best-of-seven, played in a 2-2-1-1-1 home-ice pattern. Conference champions receive the Prince of Wales Trophy in the East or the Clarence S. Campbell Bowl in the West before meeting in the Stanley Cup Final.

Fans follow the NHL playoffs for upsets, overtime finishes and decisive Game 7s, with recent champions including Vegas, Florida and Carolina. Each postseason brings familiar talking points, from the Conn Smythe Trophy race for playoff MVP to how the Presidents' Trophy winner, the team with the best regular-season record, fares in the bracket. The salary cap has produced notable parity, so almost any qualifier can go deep. Critics debate how much luck decides a best-of-seven series, and why Canadian clubs have found it so hard to match Montreal's 1993 triumph.

The playoffs have rituals all their own. Players grow playoff beards, Detroit has an octopus-throwing tradition dating to 1952, and every series ends with the handshake line. Many players refuse to touch the Cup before winning it, and some avoid the conference trophies for the same reason. Each member of a winning team traditionally gets time with the Cup over the summer, and it travels to hometowns, charity events and celebrations around the world.

Lord Stanley, Canada's Governor General, announced the trophy in 1892, buying a silver bowl for ten guineas as the Dominion Hockey Challenge Cup. The Montreal Amateur Athletic Association won it first in 1893, professional teams could challenge from 1906, and it became the NHL's prize in the late 1920s. Montreal Canadiens hold the record for championships, followed by Toronto Maple Leafs and Detroit Red Wings. The Cup went unawarded in 2005, when a lockout cancelled the season and led to the salary cap.

Three Cups exist today: the original 1892 bowl, the 1963 Presentation Cup that teams lift, and a 1993 replica that stands in at the Hockey Hall of Fame. Names of players and staff from each champion are engraved on bands, and the oldest band is retired to the Hall of Fame when the bottom one fills.

Our NewsNow feed on the NHL Stanley Cup and playoffs gathers the latest headlines on the bracket, series results, schedule, scores, odds, elimination games and Conn Smythe contenders from reliable sources. Whether you follow one club or the whole postseason, it keeps you across every Game 7 and the Stanley Cup Final.