They denied all of Canada, the hockey-inventing country that has not seen one of its teams raise the Cup since 1993.

They denied Connor McDavid, currently the consensus greatest player in the sport, his first Stanley Cup in a nine-year career, instead only magnifying the one giant hole on his resume.

And they surely denied the TV networks and most hockey fans who came for the ceremonial coronation of McDavid but instead watched the non-traditional interloper-franchise lift the Cup.

Most all of the pressure, that weight, was on the Panthers.

The Cats had led this best-of-7 Final by 3-0, seemingly on cruise control, then three straight Edmonton Oilers wins left Florida careening into a home Game 7 — and their fans equal parts hopeful and terrified.

It felt like Florida was trailing 3-3 entering the final Final game. The last three losses by a combined 18-5 marked the most lopsided three straight games in Final history.

All time in hockey history teams with a 3-0 lead had won the series in 206 of 210 occurrences, or 98%. Teams with that lead in a Final were 27-1, the lone exception in 1942.

The Cats Monday faced what would have been an epic, unforgiving collapse. National shame.

Instead they won only the eighth major professional championship in 157 combined seasons for the Heat (three), Dolphins (two), Marlins (two) and Panthers (first).

In doing so they won for Maurice his first NHL championship in three decades as a coach, on his third Final try including last year’s with Florida.

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