NHL PLAYOFF BRACKET SCHEDULE, SCORES FOR CONFERENCE FINALS

The Carolina Hurricanes and Florida Panthers are probably grateful that they had a long break between the second round and the conference finals.

The teams, who wrapped up their second-round series in five games, played four overtimes in the Eastern Conference final opener before Florida's Matthew Tkachuk scored with 12.7 seconds left to end the NHL's sixth-longest game.

The Vegas Golden Knights, who advanced in six games, and the Dallas Stars, who beat the Seattle Kraken in Game 7, also went to overtime in Game 1 but it was ended in 95 seconds by Vegas' Brett Howden.

Eastern Conference games will be broadcast by TNT, while the Western Conference games will be shown on ESPN or ABC.

The schedules for the conference finals (all times p.m. ET, x-if necessary):

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