The final two are set. The San Jose Sharks punched their ticket to the Stanley Cup Final with a 5-2 win in Game on Wednesday over the St. Louis Blues. One day prior, the Pittsburgh Penguins extended their season with a 5-2 win in Game 6 over the Tampa Bay Lightning, forcing a Game 7 on Thursday night.
Bryan Rust scored both goals for Pittsburgh as the Penguins returned to the Stanley Cup Final for the first time since 2009. The Sharks are making their first trip to the Final in franchise history.
The series begins on Monday night.
So how did these two teams get there? In short, goaltending.
Martin Jones was the goalie that had to overcome the roadblocks to a starting job. He went undrafted out of the 2008 NHL Draft after playing junior hockey with the Calgary Hitmen of the WHL. He signed on to a tryout with the Los Angeles Kings.
He played one game for the ECHL's Ontario Reign before moving to the AHL where he played four seasons with the Manchester Monarchs. In his fourth AHL season, the 2013-14 season, he got the call to the NHL to fill in for an injured Jonathan Quick. That season, he played in 19 games, going 12-6 with a 1.81 GAA and four shutout wins.
But when Quick returned, Jones was moved back into a backup role and only played in 15 games in the 2014-15 season. That's when the Kings moved him to Boston in a blockbuster deal – Jones, defenseman Colin Miller and a 2015 first-round pick for Milan Lucic — on June 26 and just four days later, sent to San Jose for a 2016 first-round pick and college prospect Sean Kuraly.
With a starting job open, Jones rose to the occasion this season, playing in 65 games and posting a 37-23-4 record with a 2.27 GAA and .918 save percentage. In the playoffs, he took it to another level with a 12-6 record, a 2.12 GAA and a .919 save percentage.
In just one season, the 26-year-old Jones has gone from the goalie that just needed a shot to start to becoming among the top goalies in the game. But he may not be the most surprising goalie to emerge this season.
On the other side, Matt Murray came from out of nowhere to become the Penguins go-to guy between the pipes.
Two seasons ago, Murray was playing in the OHL with the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds. He posted a 32-11-1 record in 2013-14 with a 2.57 GAA and made the jump to the AHL at the conclusion of the season, allowing two goals in a loss in his AHL debut with the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins.
His first season in the AHL, he posted tremendous numbers, going 25-10-3 in 40 games with a 1.58 GAA and .941 save percentage. He started the 2015-16 season at the AHL level, going 20-9-1 with a 2.10 GAA in 31 games, before making the jump to the NHL for 13 games. He won nine of them and posted a 2.00 GAA and .930 save percentage.
With Marc-Andre Fleury out with injury, the door opened for Murray to be the starter in the playoffs and he took the reins. In 15 games, he has a 11-4 record with a 2.21 GAA and .924 save percentage. And did we mention he's 22 years old, only a rookie and now has more NHL playoff games under his belt than regular season games.
So you can put the stories about the offensive depth that both teams have, the All-Stars like Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Phil Kessel and Kris Letang for the Penguins or Joe Pavelski, Joe Thornton, Patrick Marleau and Brent Burns for the Sharks, and set them aside as secondary. The goaltenders have led their teams this far, and now each is just four wins away from hoisting Lord Stanley's Cup.
The Stanley Cup Final begins in Pittsburgh on Monday night at 8 p.m.
Kevin Durso is managing editor for Flyerdelphia. Follow him on Twitter @Kevin_Durso.
