Why do Florida Panthers fans toss rats on the ice? Here’s how it all started

The Florida Panthers have been in the NHL Final the past three years. They won the title last year and hope to bring home the Stanley Cup again this year in a rematch with the Edmonton Oilers.

So it’s time to get your rats ready.

Rats and Panthers started going together during the 1995-96 season. That was when a player saw a live one in the locker room, then at the old Miami Arena, and took care of it with his stick.

With the Panthers going on to the Stanley Cup Finals that season, the rat became the symbol of success. Fans tossed them on the ice after goals and victories.

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So let’s look back at the early Panther success and the birth of the rat for luck and celebration.

From the Miami Herald archives:

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Year of the rat

Published April 13, 2016

By Greg Cote

It was Oct. 8, 1995, the night of the Panthers’ home opener, one night after the season had begun with a dispiriting 4-0 loss in New Jersey.

Minutes before a team of fully uniformed, stick-carrying players were to leave the dressing room to take the ice for the national anthem, a rat pelted across the carpet.

To Scott Mellanby, the speeding rodent — black in color — must have looked like a puck.

Instinct took over.

“Scotty laid his stick on the carpet and timed that rat into the wall,” team captain and eyewitness Brian Skrudland recalled.

Concrete Wall 1, Rat 0.

Mellanby used the same killing stick to score two goals that night and lead a 4-3 win over Calgary.

“A rat trick!” goalie John Vanbiesbrouck coined the phrase in the newspapers, and a legend was born, a dead rodent transmogrifying suddenly into something that would bond a team and its fans.

“It was an in-the-moment type of thing. Came to the top of my head,” the Beezer said. “It was just a fun comment. We were in such a good mood after that game!”

Before long, toy rats — more and more of them — peppered the ice after Panthers goals and wins.

By the playoffs, they were raining in the hundreds (leading to a subsequent NHL rule prohibiting them during games).

I recall during that ’96 playoff run seeing dozens of Panthers employees scurry onto the ice after home goals scooping thrown rats into white plastic pails. At least one employee used one of those giant push-broom squeegees like you see used to help move puddles from tennis courts. In the catacombs of the arena after games, you’d see huge clear plastic bags turned dark by the collected toy rats that filled them.

Former coach Doug MacLean, 20 years later, still recalls a postgame report given him one night as a team employee trotted toward him.

“He says, ‘Hey, coach, 983 rats we picked up on the ice last night. I loved seeing them come!’ ”

Said Mellanby, rat killer, legend maker: “I had no idea that night that it would turn into what it turned into. It was a big part of my career I’ll never forget. It’s pretty cool people remember it and embrace it still.”

Maybe the current Panthers will equal or even surpass the ’96 bunch as the playoffs commence, led by the mysterious good luck of that “Spacey in Space” sweatshirt.

“We can’t wait till we’re a smaller part of the franchise lore, when there’s finally a Stanley Cup to celebrate,” as the old captain Skrudland put it. “But in the meantime, we’re that magical Cinderella story.”

Who says Panthers fans won’t be attending a championship parade on the 20th anniversary of unexpectedly coming so close.

If a fairy tale can star a dead rat, isn’t anything possible?

Rules of the rat

Published April 14, 2016

In 1996, the rules to throwing rats on the ice at a Florida Panthers game was simple: Toss ‘em after a goal. Since then, the NHL has changed the rules a bit. Here’s what you need to know for proper rat etiquette:

▪ When can I throw my rat? Only after the game is complete and preferably following a Florida Panthers victory. It looks kind of weird when fans throw rats after a loss, although if it’s at the end of a hard-fought series, go ahead.

▪ Where do I get a rat? At the rubber rat store, of course. OK, there’s no such place so you have to be creative. Some party supply stores still have them from Halloween as do some dollar stores. They can also be ordered in bulk through Amazon.

▪ Do I need to sneak my rats in? No, the rats are as connected to the team as its feline mascot Stanley C. Panther. The Panthers even added a rodent mascot named Viktor E. Rat, who runs around the arena with Stanley.

▪ What if I get excited and throw my rat after a goal? The Panthers don’t like that. Too many rats could cost them a delay of game penalty as it did last month when the team gave out 10,000 commemorative rats before a game with the Devils. Florida was slapped with two delay of game penalties that night and is believed to be the first team to be so penalized by on-ice officials.

▪ Do players like the rats? Apparently so. Some are known to scoop some up and bring them home after wins, while others like hitting them back into the stands with their stick.

This story was originally published June 4, 2025 at 5:00 AM.