Golden Knights break through NHL's rigid structure to win well-deserved Stanley Cup

Although they are the second-youngest franchise in the league, often mischaracterized as a city spoiled by precocious success and blinding excess in equal measure, the Vegas Golden Knights are replete with decorated veterans.

During a 9-3 blowout victory over the Florida Panthers in Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Final on Tuesday, the 111-point Golden Knights proved they are more than deserving champions, with the requisite experience, guile, infusion of youth and elite goaltending to thrive during the rigors of a gruesome postseason.

Vegas already proved the three maxims of playoff hockey to be true in a nearly identical 7-2 victory in Game 2. Over the course of Tuesday’s closeout game, it crushed its opponent with institutional knowledge, opportunism and superior goaltending.

But it didn’t appear to be a coronation during the opening five minutes.

Golden Knights captain Mark Stone registered two critical turnovers, while Jack Eichel fumbled a zone exit that directly led to a breakaway for Panthers forward Anton Lundell but goalie Adin Hill, as he did all postseason, closed the door. If you believe in momentum, it firmly swung in the Golden Knights’ favor and it ran over a wounded Panthers team, missing superstar Matthew Tkachuk and the underrated Eetu Luostarinen.

There’s a school of thought that the Golden Knights benefited from lax rules surrounding expansion franchises and exploited loopholes around player protections, while being too loud — both in-arena and on social media — and going against the grain of the NHL’s buttoned-down culture.

This notion is outright nonsense.

Stone, who deservedly lifted the Cup after his Game 5 hat trick, was acquired from a frugal Ottawa Senators organization that was unwilling to pay him anywhere near his eight-year, $76-million pact he eventually signed with the Golden Knights. Stone’s linemate, Chandler Stephenson, was acquired for a fifth-round pick in December 2019. Eichel, who led the postseason with 26 points, was readily available after the Buffalo Sabres proved intent on humiliating him, while refusing to let him undergo the artificial disk replacement surgery he wanted. Vegas also created room to sign Alex Pietrangelo to a seven-year, $61-million contract.

Golden Knights general manager Kelly McCrimmon took advantage of a rigid league and it’s a remarkable accomplishment to win the Cup after six years of operation.

Stone started the onslaught Tuesday evening, Nicolas Hague added to it, then Alec Martinez scored his second goal of the playoffs, nine years to the day after he scored the Cup-winning overtime goal for the Los Angeles Kings in 2014. Martinez led all players in blocked shots and the 35-year-old formed a tremendous, veteran top pairing with Pietrangelo, charting the course for the rest of the defense corps. Hague is on the other end of the equation, a towering 24-year-old that the Golden Knights smartly selected in the second round of the 2017 NHL Draft. He's not known for his offensive flair but contributed on the scoresheet in consecutive contests.

Vegas combined star power, experience and younger players looking for a chance to shine on the biggest stage.

Jonathan Marchessault — the Conn Smythe Trophy winner — Reilly Smith, William Karlsson, Shea Theodore and Brayden McNabb were all rewarded for their loyalty by head coach Bruce Cassidy in Game 5. Along with William Carrier, all of these players, dubbed as “The Misfits,” remained with the Golden Knights since their inception. Theodore has emerged as one of the NHL’s best defensemen, McNabb does all the small things well, Karlsson and Smith — who linked up perfectly on the fourth goal — are genuine two-way threats, while Marchessault shot the lights out during the postseason, finishing with 13 goals and 25 points.

All of these players watched Stephenson and the Washington Capitals lift the Cup in 2018 and perhaps a victory in their inaugural season wouldn’t have made this year’s victory so sweet. It was a short interval relative to the rest of the league, but try telling any of the Misfits that a five-year hiatus was anything but excruciating.

Hill could’ve emerged as the Conn Smythe winner and few would balk at the suggestion. He was propelled into action in the second round against the Edmonton Oilers and never looked back. Panthers netminder Sergei Bobrovsky played at a level few had ever witnessed prior to the Final, while Hill was considered another stellar part of a Golden Knights team that was better than the sum of its parts.

And yet Hill finished the series with nearly two goals saved above expected, while Bobrovsky allowed two more goals than expected — this catch-all metric is better used in a larger sample to be clear, but still holds some weight.

In some ways, this Golden Knights team was a misnomer, a 111-point, No. 1 seed that was rarely viewed as such until it was too late. The rival Oilers were billed as the West’s favourite, few people had even heard of Hill prior to the second round, while the Eastern Conference was widely considered to be far superior than the Western circuit.

Proponents of advanced stats pointed to the Golden Knights' middling, underlying possession and shot-creation numbers. Cassidy was unceremoniously dismissed by the Bruins and though it didn’t take long for him to reestablish himself as one of the NHL’s premier coaches, this wasn’t a certainty. After all, the Golden Knights were reeling from missing the playoffs for the first time in 2022, entering uncharted waters. There’s something to be said for experience, resilience, some youth and elite goaltending winning out and the Golden Knights pummelled an exhausted Panthers team that had run through a gauntlet of Eastern powers.

We’re now entering the natural phase of summer where pundits, journalists and fans will try to place the Golden Knights in the annals of history and perhaps this team won’t be remembered fondly in the years to follow. After ascending to the top of the NHL in six years, we doubt the Golden Knights care, and who could possibly blame them?