Rantanen is the first player in NHL history to score a hat trick in the third period of a Game 7, and the first to record multiple four-point periods in a single postseason after also achieving the feat with a goal and three assists in the second period of Game 6.

And to think, there was about a week there where the entire hockey world was wondering if Mikko Rantanen was going to show up in this series. Rantanen scored three third-period goals — two Herculean solo efforts and an empty-netter — to erase a two-goal deficit,