NHL Conference Finals

The National Hockey League (NHL) Conference Finals are the Eastern Conference and Western Conference Championship series of the NHL. The Conference Finals are best-of-seven series. The two series are played in late May each year after the first and second rounds of the playoffs and before the Finals. The final two teams in the Eastern conference and Western Conference face off. The series are the conference equivalents of the Stanley Cup Finals.

Before the 1967-68 season, the NHL was only made up of a single division. From the 1967-68 season through the 1973-74 season, the NHL was made up of two divisions (as opposed to conferences), an East Division and a West Division.

Following the 1973-74 season, the NHL again realigned. The East and West Divisions were renamed the Prince of Wales and Clarence Campbell Conferences, respectively. This was because at the time, since the new conferences and divisions had little to do with North American geography, geographical references were removed.

Beginning in the 1981-82 season, the Conferences & the playoffs were realigned.

Beginning in the 1993-94 season, the names of conferences and divisions were changed to reflect the their geographic locations. Then-new NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman made the change to help non-hockey fans better understand the game, as the National Basketball Association, National Football League, and Major League Baseball all use geographic-based names for their conferences and divisions. Therefore, the Campbell Conference became the Western Conference and the Wales Conference became the Eastern Conference.

The respective winners of the Eastern and Western Conference Finals receive the Prince of Wales Trophy and Clarence S. Campbell Bowl.

Four teams, the Phoenix Coyotes, the Nashville Predators, the Atlanta Thrashers and the Columbus Blue Jackets are the only teams to never appear in a Conference Final. All four of these teams have appeared in the Conference Quarter-finals.

Team totals
Legend: CF = Conference Finals; SCF = Stanley Cup Finals