The Vegas Golden Knights won the first Stanley Cup in their young history, defeating the Florida Panthers, four wins to one, in the final of the North American Ice Hockey Championship (NHL) on Tuesday, June 13. In front of their home crowd, the Nevada franchise was crowned thanks to their crushing success, 9 to 3, in the decisive fifth game of the series.
Created in 2017, it is the fastest expansion franchise to reach this Holy Grail. The precocity record previously belonged to the Philadelphia Flyers, after only seven seasons in the NHL.
After having made the break (3-2) during the previous meeting at Sunrise in Florida, the Golden Knights did not miss the opportunity to finish the job in front of their supporters, by offering them a fireworks display, thanks in particular to a hat-trick from Mark Stone and three assists from Jack Eichel, two of their strong men during these playoffs.
They got off to the best possible start in the first half, with two goals in less than two minutes, scored first by Stone, who left alone on the counter-attack, then Nicolas Hague, at the end of a big mess in front of opposing cages.
Jack Eichel at the top
The Panthers only deceived themselves at the start of the second period, when Aaron Ekblad placed a superb shot closing the gap in the top corner. But Vegas got back on the gas, scoring four times in the final ten minutes. First through Alec Martinez, who also cleared the right bracket of Florida goals after a raise from his own side, then Reilly Smith and Mark Stone, before Michael Amadio completed this one-way sequence.
In the final period, Ivan Barbashev netted his team’s seventh goal after an assist from Jack Eichel, his twentieth in 22 playoff games. Adding them to his 6 goals scored, the American climbed to the top of the scoring charts with 26 units.
For the honor, the Panthers scored twice through their two Sams, Reinhart and Bennett, but Stone completed his hat-trick for the Golden Knights by sending the puck into the goal abandoned by the Floridian goalkeeper, before in the last moments Nicolas Roy does not weigh down the bill a little more.
For Las Vegas, this second coronation opportunity, after failing in 2018 against Washington in his first season in the NHL, will have been the right one. The Florida Panthers, on the other hand, failed a second time on the last step, after falling to the Colorado Avalanche in 1996.