On The Strip, Noah Hanifin scored midway through the thid period on Friday night to give the Golden Knights a 1-0 lead on the Dallas Stars in Game 6 of their first round Stanley Cup Playoffs series. 
“[Noah’s] a good hockey player. He can finish plays. He’s done a good job for us in all areas,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said. “We need a goal tonight, right? We were struggling early to finish. We generated a lot of chances. Someone had to break through. It happened to be him.
“He jumped on a loose puck. He definitely has good instincts on offense in terms of being assertive and on his toes.”
That was enough to get the Knights even at 3-3 in the series and force a Game 7 back in Dallas on Sunday.
Vegas tacked on an empty-net strike for a 2-0 win.
“I always have confidence in myself,” Hill said. . “My game had a little stretch there where I struggled and let some goals in that I should haven’t, but in practice, I never really lost it. It’s a mental thing, more than anything. When I got my number called in Game 5 (a 3-2 loss), I just went out and tried to be positive and have a good game. I felt like I played decent that game, though a couple of things I could have cleaned up.
“I felt like it came together a little better tonight, but it’s a team effort out there.”
Hanifin collected the puck above the right circle after Vegas tried to cycle the puck out high in the zone. He went to the boards, holding off the Dallas defender and then cut left for a wrist shot through a screen.
“It’s been a really tight series. There’s not a lot of room out there,” Hanifin said. “They’re a great team, and they play really well defensively, as do we. So yeah, it was nice to be able to squeeze one by them tonight. I think we did a really good job of hanging on to the lead and not sitting back too much.”
Dallas’ Miro Heiskanen missed on a breakaway opportunity in the 17th minute of the third.
“What a game for goaltenders,” Cassidy said. “It’s a 0-0 game in the third. Sometimes those are snooze fests, right? But it wasn’t tonight. I think it was one of those games that the goalies were just the two dominant players in the game. Eventually something had to give and went our way.”
Mark Stone cleared the puck from the Vegas zone, banking the puck off the boards and into an empty bet with 19 seconds left for the 2-0 final count on the scoreboard.
“There’s nothing better than Game 7,” said Dallas coach Pete DeBoer, who is 7-0 in Game 7. “I mean, that’s what you grow up dreaming about — you know, playing, and the second-best thing is coaching in them. So yeah, just excited. I mean, I’m so excited for our group. I’m excited for our fans in Dallas.”
Jake Oettinger made 28 saves in the loss. He was screened on the game winner and never saw the puck leave Hanifin’s stick.
“I try to do my job,” Oettinger said. “I feel like [if] I play like that on Sunday we’re going to win. … It feels like we’ve played really well this series. If we roll out our best games, we should like the result.”
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