2014 Stanley Cup Final

The 2014 Stanley Cup Final was the championship series of the National Hockey League's (NHL) 2013–14 season, and the culmination of the 2014 Stanley Cup playoffs. The League realigned its divisions prior to the season, and changed the structure of the playoffs, but the championship series remained the same. The Western Conference champion Los Angeles Kings defeated the Eastern Conference champion New York Rangers four games to one to win their second championship in franchise history, marking the first time since 2007 that the championship series was determined in fewer than six games. Their Stanley Cup–winning run of 26 playoff games was later tied by the 2019 St. Louis Blues for the longest of any Stanley Cup–winning team in history.

Los Angeles had home ice advantage in the series, as the Kings finished with a better regular season record than the Rangers. The series started on June 4 and ended on June 13 with the Kings winning their second Stanley Cup in three seasons. It was the first meeting between teams from New York City and Los Angeles for a major professional sports championship since the Yankees and the Dodgers played in the 1981 World Series. Coincidentally, 1981 was also the last time the Rangers and the Kings had met in the postseason; that was the last season where the league did not use a geographical based playoff format and as a result any two teams could meet in any round of the postseason regardless of geography. In 1981 the Rangers eliminated the Kings during the first round of the playoffs.

This was the eighth meeting between teams from Los Angeles and New York City for a major professional sports championship. This previously occurred in four World Series (1963, 1977, 1978, 1981), and three NBA Finals (1970, 1972, 1973).

This was New York's 11th appearance in the Stanley Cup Final, and they were seeking their fifth Cup championship overall and their first one since 1994, 20 years earlier. Since their win in 1994, their only other post-season highlights were reaching the Conference Finals in 1997 and 2012.

The Rangers entered the season after essentially swapping head coaches with the Vancouver Canucks: the Rangers and the Canucks fired John Tortorella and Alain Vigneault, respectively, and then coincidentally hired the other's former coach. While Vancouver, under Tortorella's first year, failed to make the playoffs, Vigneault guided New York to 96 regular season points and second place in the new Metropolitan Division. En route, the Rangers made a major trade with the Tampa Bay Lightning on March 5, acquiring Tampa Bay's captain Martin St. Louis in exchange for their own captain Ryan Callahan. The transaction happened as Callahan and the Rangers were not close to terms on a new contract, while St. Louis was unhappy at his initial omission from the Olympics by Steve Yzerman (general manager of both the Lightning and Team Canada).

In the first round of the playoffs, the Rangers eliminated the Philadelphia Flyers in seven games. Then, in the second round against the Pittsburgh Penguins, New York overcame a 3–1 game deficit to win the series. In the Eastern Conference Finals, the Rangers defeated the Montreal Canadiens in six games to capture their first Eastern Conference championship in 20 years. In the process, the Rangers became the first team ever to play two full seven-game series in the first two rounds of the playoffs and reach the Stanley Cup Final, a feat later matched and exceeded in the same postseason by the Kings.

Due to trading away captain Ryan Callahan and not naming a successor for the remainder of the season, Rangers were the first team since the 1972–73 Chicago Black Hawks to advance to the Stanley Cup Final without a captain.

By reaching the Finals with the Rangers, Mats Zuccarello made history when he became the first Norwegian to play in the Stanley Cup Final.