From his post at the far end of the ice, Sergei Bobrovsky stands at 6 feet, 5 inches tall, towering above the hockey net’s crossbar. (Barefoot, he’s 6 feet, 2 inches tall; the skates only enhance his natural height.)
Spot him off-ice at a media interview or prepping in the locker room and he’s a big guy, sure. But when he’s decked out in the full goalie gear—a hulking pair of three-piece leg pads, a chest guard, armored pants, a neck protector, plus a catching glove and a massive blocker glove—he’s got the imposing bulk of a gladiator about to do battle.
And then there’s the iconic helmet and mask. Propped casually atop his head, it’s an airbrushed spectacle repping the Panthers’ team colors and Florida-centric symbols. But as he methodically drops it into place and fastens the chin strap, it feels like a door has closed to a world only he inhabits. When Bobrovsky is covered from head to toe in his goalkeeper glory, it’s hard for anyone else to tell exactly what he is thinking (or where he’s focusing) in any given moment.
To say that it’s an intimidating look is an understatement. But as you watch the 36-year-old Russian goalie and star of the 2024 Stanley Cup–winning Florida Panthers begin his warm-up routine, you begin to see the ballet inherent in his battle prep. Alone on the ice, he circles the rink, testing the edges of his skates as he cuts them into the frozen surface—first one foot, then the other—for a lap or two. He makes a series of half circles, balancing on his right skate as he leans one way and then on his left skate to lean in the opposite direction. He repeats the pattern, this time going backward. He works his arms and wrists in circles, then drops to one knee at a time, sliding forward to stretch out each leg as far as it will go—then seemingly even farther. Just when you think he’s pushed the limits of human flexibility, Bobrovsky slowly lowers himself even more, digging into the ice with the inner edges of his skates until he’s in a butterfly position before pressing himself into an improbable full split.
“I like to get out there before everybody else,” he admits. “I like to get out there early on the ice and do my routine to get in sync with my mind and my body. That’s where it all starts.”
Ask anyone who has worked with him over his storied career, and they’ll tell you that “Bob” or “Bobby,” as he’s affectionately known, is the hardest working guy on the Panthers roster, or any roster for that matter. It’s an ethos that Bobrovsky says comes from his upbringing in Novokuznetsk, Russia. Set in southwestern Siberia, it’s an industrial town where people understand the value of hard work.
“My mom worked in the factory and my dad worked in coal mining,” he says. “Growing up, I was always seeing how hard people work. And all of that built up into me.”
Hard work aside, Bobrovsky says there was time for fun, too. “My dad played soccer in the summers and hockey in the winters,” he recalls. “He brought me with him to every game he played with his workmates. That’s when I fell in love with sports.”
As a 7-year-old, Bobrovsky played youth hockey. His parents were supportive, but they weren’t particularly keen on their son tending goal. But Bobrovsky had other plans. The first lure? The cool goalie gear.
“As an adult, you realize there is a puck flying 200 kilometers per hour toward your body, and it seems crazy to choose to be a goalie,” he says. “But when I was a kid, I thought the goalie gear looked so fine. I dreamt of being in the goal, but my parents always talked me out of it.”
Then, fate struck: the team’s only net minder came down with the flu on the day before a big game.
“Coach came to us and said, ‘Who wants to be a goalie?’ I was the only one who raised a hand,” he recalls. “Right away, he showed me the proper stance and outfitted me in the gear. When my parents came to pick me up after practice, Coach said to them, ‘We have a new goalie now.’ There was nothing they could say in return.”
The next day, with Bobrovsky in the net, his team won, 6 to 4. “That was it,” he says. “That’s how my goalie journey began.”
Fast-forward a decade to 2006: what should have been Bobrovsky’s National Hockey League (NHL) draft year came and went without an offer. Instead, he stayed in Russia to play four seasons with Metallurg Novokuznetsk, a Siberian team in the Kontinental Hockey League. His performance eventually caught the attention of NHL scouts, leading to a 2010 contract with the Philadelphia Flyers. That work ethic he developed from watching his hometown folks toil away at a lifetime of factory jobs? It paid off in spades: Bobrovsky won the 2013 Calder Memorial Trophy as the NHL’s rookie of the year.
After moving to the Columbus Blue Jackets, Bobrovsky cemented his star power by winning the coveted Vezina Trophy (awarded annually to the NHL’s best goaltender) in both 2013 and 2017. But by 2019, he was on the hunt for something new. He found it with the Florida Panthers, who offered him a seven-year, $70-million contract. But the move wasn’t as smooth as he might have liked. In his first season with the Panthers, Bobrovsky struggled to replicate previous successes. And then the season ended early due to COVID-19.
He says in moments of trial like those—whether finding his groove on a new team, dealing with a shortened season, or facing a puck-handler intent on scoring—it’s all about mindset.
“You have to trust your ability to stop any puck at any time. But you also have to understand that at this level there are really talented guys playing against you. In some situations, they might score on you.” When that happens, Bobrovsky says, he doesn’t punish himself. “I refocus and reset. I shake it off.”
And when he makes a great save? “Same thing,” he says. “It sounds crazy. But if you make a big save, you can’t stay with it, just like you can’t stay with a shot that makes it past you. Either way, you have to let it go and get ready for the next shot, the next moment, the next save.”
One of the biggest (or at least one of the most famous) saves of Bobrovsky’s career came in 2024 during Game 2 of the Eastern Conference First Round against the Tampa Bay Lightning. With the score tied 2 to 2, Bobrovsky twisted and dove sideways across the crease to block the puck. (The Panthers went on to win 3 to 2 in overtime and eventually won the series in five games.) Bobrovsky says the now-iconic save (which was dubbed “The Bobbery” and launched an array of merch, from commemorative pucks to T-shirts) went beyond his physical and mental powers and into the spiritual realm.
“I was out of position,” he recalls. “I threw my body as much as I could to cover [the net] but I didn’t think it would be enough. And all of a sudden, the puck came into my glove. I think God helped our team in that moment.”
Making an otherworldly, viral save is one thing. Winning a Stanley Cup—something that neither the Florida Panthers nor Bobrovsky had ever done before—is another. When the team capped off its thirtieth season with a Game 7 victory against the Edmonton Oilers, team captain Aleksander “Sasha” Barkov hoisted the trophy first, skating around the ice in a giddy victory lap. But he passed the precious cargo next to Bobrovsky, whose usual straight-faced stare transformed into a wide grin as he kissed the Cup and held it aloft. It’s a night, he says, that will stay with him forever.
“Two moments hit me that night,” he says. “First, when the game ends, you realize you’ve made it through all the challenges and hurdles with your teammates and you feel a kind of relief. And then there’s the moment when you get to lift the Cup. It’s the culmination of your dream. You’ve imagined it so many times before, but now it’s reality. When Sasha handed the Cup to me, that was not relief anymore that I was feeling. That feeling was pure joy.”
Just four months after that joyful night, Bobrobsky added another career milestone to his already Hall-of-Fame-worthy résumé: his 400th career win. Not too shabby, considering he’s only the fourteenth goaltender in NHL history to hit that mark—and he got there faster than anyone else on the list, achieving the feat in just 707 career games and joining legendary names like Marc-André Fleury, Martin Brodeur, Patrick Roy, and the Panthers’ own Roberto Luongo.
Through it all, Bobrovsky has stayed humble. “If 20 years ago somebody had told me that I was going to be on that list, I would have said, ‘You are joking.’ Right now, I can’t even fully appreciate it. I think I’m going to appreciate it all—the big wins, the big saves, the big awards—a lot more when I finish my career. When I look back, those moments are going to melt my heart.”
But with two more years left on his contract with the Panthers, Bobrovsky isn’t looking back—only forward. “I don’t think about two games, two months, two years,” he says. “In the goal, in my career, in my life, I always stay in the moment.”
And what a great moment it is.
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