On Tuesday night, one of the greatest gambles in🐲 the history of Las Vegas paid off. ꦏFor the first time in their history, the Golden Knights are Stanley Cup champions.
Florida was without an injured Matthew Tkachuk. They tried to hang around as best they could, but trailed 2-0 after the first period💝. Aaron Ekblad cut the lead to one early in the second period, but Vegas scored four unanswered goals in the final ten minutes of the period to blow the game wi𓃲de open.
The party was on. The fans were losing their minds with every score. And Florida looked like they just didn’t have an answer for anything.
Just as the Denver Nuggets did on Monday night in the NBA Finals, the top seed in the Western Conference dispatched the Eastern Conference’s 8-seed — from south Florida — in the fifth game of the championship series.
The final score of the clinching game: 9-3.
Jonathan Marchessault won the Conn Smythe Trophy as the postseason MVP. He’s the first undrafted player to win the Conn Smythe since… Wayne Gretzky.
Golden Prophecy Fulfilled
Six years ago, the Vegas Golden Knights were born.🐼 At the time, owner Bill Foley said his expectation was to win a Stanley Cup championship within six years of the birth of the franchise.
One full season and postseason later — on TODAY’s date, June 13, 2018 — to Vegas fans after the expansion franchise made an unprecedented (albeit unsuccessful) trip to the Stanley Cup Final. In it, Foley reiterated his expectation that the franchise would win a championship within the first six seasons of its existence.
“Despite these naysayers, we kept saying our expectation was ‘playoffs in three, Stanley Cup in six.’ People thought we were nuts,” Foley wrote.
Last year, Vegas made the blockbuster trade for Jack Eichel, but missed the playoffs. It felt like a significant step backwards for the franchise. Fast forward 13 months and Eichel has been dominant in these playoffs, washing away the “he’s not Connor McDavid” memories from the 2015 draft and the awkward time he spent in Buffalo to emerge as a hero in his first career postseason.
Mark Stone, who has had multiple back surgeries in the past couple years, scored a hat trick (including one into an empty net with six minutes left in regulation) in the deciding game. Vegas’ captain was a question mark for the postseason, but he’s been outstanding throughout.
Marchessault, who was selected by Vegas from Florida in the expansion draft but — again — was never drafted by an NHL team to begin his professional hockey career, led the playoffs in scoring with 13 goals (tied with Leon Draisaitl).
And Adin Hill, who wasn’t even the starting goaltender for Vegas when the postseason began, stood on his head when there were a few trying moments early in the game and will now have his name etched forever in the history books as a Stanley Cup-winning goaltender.
