Original six set to revisit Stanley Cup Final in Las Vegas

LAS VEGAS – The Vegas Golden Knights are set to open the 2023 NHL Stanley Cup Final on home ice on Saturday night.

It is the first revisit to the Final for Vegas since their inaugural season in 2017-18.

Six players remain rostered for the Golden Knight from that first appearance, William Carrier, William Karlsson, Jonathan Marchessault, Reilly Smith, Brayden McNabb, and Shea Theodore will ice for Vegas this evening in Game 1.

“It’s tough to see that a lot of the teammates that we had starting here in Vegas aren’t here anymore,” Smith said. “But you do realize that we have such an aggressive management group that they’re trying to win every single year. We put such a good product on the ice the first year that the expectation has gone up every single year, and you had to lose teammates in the process.”

On this week’s ProHockeyNews’ podcast, the talked about the tough decisions NHL general managers have to make, and the need for cutting emotional ties out of those decisions.

Vegas GM, Kelly McCrimmon, said much the same thing on Friday at a media event.

“It’s damn tough,” McCrimmon said at Stanley Cup Final Media Day on Friday. “But at the same time, if you have these jobs and you want to avoid the hard decisions, you probably shouldn’t have these jobs.”

This season is a return to the playoffs after the Knights were riddled with injuries last campaign, to the extent they fell short of reaching the post season.

“It’s been a process that’s, I think, been calculated,” McCrimmon said. “I think it’s been based on good decisions made for the right reasons. Our goal is to win. Our goal is to win the Stanley Cup. That’s what we’re trying to accomplish, and that’s what we hope to do.”

This is a business, and McCrimmon has focused on creating a winning team on the ice that translates into success in the seats, and the Vegas environs.

“We think we’ve built our best team,” McCrimmon said. “We like the makeup of our roster. Bruce and his staff have done a tremendous job coaching that roster to the identity that we as hockey operations envisioned. We’re a four-line team. We have those top players at all the key positions, but we also have very good depth.”

The Golden Knights have been one of the more successful NHL franchises in the last six, with 267 regular season wins, and 50 playoff wins since their inception.

“A lot of teams would love to have the success that we’ve had, not just in my time, but in the whole organization’s time,” Vegas’ Mark Stone said. “But for us now, it’s about getting over that hump here.”