Carolina Hurricanes Win First Stanley Cup In 20 Years, Beat Vegas Golden Knights 3-0 In Game 6

The wait is finally over in Carolina. Twenty years after winning the first Stanley Cup in franchise history, the Hurricanes defeated the Vegas Golden Knights 3-0 in Game 6 on Sunday night in Las Vegas to claim their second championship and complete a remarkable postseason run.

The Hurricanes' championship-clinching performance looked much like the style that carried them through the postseason. They dictated pace and took the aggression to the Golden Knights, who went multiple stretches of the night without recording a shot on goal.

A suffocating performance

Taylor Hall opened the scoring for the Hurricanes, netting his seventh of the playoffs just 3:47 into the game. He finished the playoffs with 19 points, including a franchise record 11 on the road.

Up 1-0 in the second, Jackson Blake’s seventh of the postseason put Carolina up 2-0. From there, the Hurricanes stymied any effort the Golden Knights made to come back. 

Vegas went the final 15:43 seconds of the second period without recording a shot. That was followed up by going the first 2:57 of the third without putting a puck on Carolina goaltender Brandon Bussi. In fact, after 11 first-period shots, the Golden Knights had 11 over the final 40 minutes, including only two in a stretch of 30 minutes between the second and third periods.

But that doesn’t mean Bussi wasn’t tested. 

The 27-year-old who took over for Frederik Anderson in Game 4 made 22 saves for his first career Stanley Cup Final shutout. No save was bigger than the diving stop on Pavel Dorofeyev with five seconds left in the first to keep the score 1-0 heading into the first break.

Nikolaj Ehlers officially sealed the championship with an empty-net goal with 1:08 remaining. The veteran winger finished the postseason with 18 points in 18 games.

While Bussi and Ehlers delivered the finishing touches, the Hurricanes didn't forget the players who helped get them to that point. Andersen didn't play again after being pulled in Game 4, but his teammates showed how much his postseason meant to the run when Jordan Staal handed him the Stanley Cup first during the on-ice celebration. The moment caught Andersen off guard and left him feeling "every emotion [he] could think of."

“I’m just so proud of the team we have here,” he said.

Staal also had a postseason to remember. Awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP, Staal scored six goals in the final.  He won his first Stanley Cup with Pittsburgh in 2009, and the 17-year gap is the largest between Cups for a player in NHL history. He’s also the oldest player, at 37, to win the award.

"This is something I've been going after ever since we got the first one," Staal said afterward. "You want to win it again and again and again. And what a feeling, what a battle."

Another long-time member of the organization, Rod Brind’Amour was the 35-year-old captain of the Hurricanes when they won in 2006. Winning it as coach after eight years behind the bench, he says, puts it in a different perspective.

“I wanted it as a player—I really wanted it—but I wanted it for these guys as a coach,” he said. “It means so much, and to see how happy they are. I mean, I’m an old guy now. I had my one, but it’s for these guys. This is what it’s all about.”

Vegas, who made it to the final for the third time in their nine years of existence, fell to 1-2 all-time in the round. Carter Hart, who was the first goaltender to give up four or more goals in the first five games of a Stanley Cup Final, gave up just two goals on 23 shots. It just came on the night when the offense failed to produce much pressure.