{"id":2228,"date":"2026-06-02T20:38:06","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T20:38:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/raleighmovingnews.com\/?p=2228"},"modified":"2026-06-02T20:38:06","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T20:38:06","slug":"carolina-vegas-rugged-and-rolling-as-they-open-a-stanley-cup-final-nearly-a-decade-in-the-making","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/raleighmovingnews.com\/?p=2228","title":{"rendered":"Carolina, Vegas rugged and rolling as they open a Stanley Cup Final nearly a decade in the making"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) \u2014 Rod Brind\u2019Amour knows the exact moment he realized the Carolina Hurricanes could be Stanley Cup contenders.<\/p>\n

Read more Temperatures slowly rise back into the 90s by the end of the week\u00a0in central NC<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cEight years ago,\u201d he said. That was when Brind\u2019Amour took over as coach, beginning a journey of making the playoffs every year and falling short of the final each time until now.<\/p>\n

The Vegas Golden Knights were born nine years ago, but from the time they pillaged the rest of the NHL in the expansion draft through this spring, they have set championship expectations. They made the final in their inaugural season and won it all in 2023. Their third visit to the Cup Final is perhaps their most surprising.<\/p>\n

This Vegas-Carolina final is almost a decade in the making for a pair of teams in non-traditional markets that have become powerhouses. The collision course brought them to this moment, a best-of-seven series that begins with Game 1 on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s for all the marbles,\u201d Golden Knights forward Cole Smith said. \u201cJust the way they play, they play a really fast game. So do we. It\u2019s going to be a really great series.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brind\u2019Amour has been a Carolina constant<\/h2>\n

The Hurricanes won their only Stanley Cup championship in 2006, when Brind\u2019Amour was their captain. He played 9 1\/2 seasons for them and spent seven more as an assistant before getting named coach in 2018. He has been a part of 98 of Carolina\u2019s 100 playoff victories since the franchise formerly known as the Whalers moved from Hartford in \u201997.<\/p>\n

\u201cRoddy\u2019s been at the helm of it the whole time and just establishing the culture that we do have here,\u201d said defenseman Jaccob Slavin, now in his 11th season with the team. \u201cIt\u2019s been building and building and we\u2019ve been close and knocking at the door. I think we finally just have the right personnel, the right commitment, the right buy-in because our game really hasn\u2019t changed.\u201d<\/p>\n

Slavin, captain Jordan Staal, grinder Jordan Martinook and center Sebastian Aho have been together since the time Brind\u2019Amour got promoted, and wingers Andrei Svechnikov and Seth Jarvis and goaltender Frederik Andersen got added the well-established core along the way. The Hurricanes won at least one series every year but had never strung together three in a row.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been trying really hard for eight years, and it\u2019s not anybody\u2019s fault,\u201d Martinook said. \u201cIt\u2019s just we\u2019ve fallen short.\u201d<\/p>\n

What has been different for the Hurricanes<\/h2>\n

Logan Stankoven, acquired at the trade deadline last year when Mikko Rantanen was sent to Dallas six weeks after Carolina got him from Colorado, has thrived at center on the second line between Taylor Hall and Jackson Blake. Stankoven leads the team with nine goals.<\/p>\n

Hall, who came from Chicago in that initial three-way trade with Rantanen, tops the Hurricanes with 16 points. Nikolaj Ehlers, signed last summer as a free agent, had a monster Game 2 of the East final after they lost the series opener, including scoring the overtime winner.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think I\u2019ve done anything special to get this group (here),\u201d Ehlers said. \u201cThis group was ready for it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Carolina is 12-1 this playoffs, the fewest losses to get to the final since 1983. Brind\u2019Amour feels like this is where his team has belonged for a long time but still has unfinished business.<\/p>\n

Read more Free gun locks available at Durham County Public Health<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think we have broken through,\u201d Brind\u2019Amour said. \u201cYou\u2019ve got to win. I know everyone makes a lot about getting this far, but nobody\u2019s going to remember who comes in second.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Golden Knights were winners from the start<\/h2>\n

Vegas came in second during its inaugural season when no one expected the expansion team to be any good. The Golden Knights went all the way to the final before losing to Washington in five games.<\/p>\n

\u201cSet the tone right away,\u201d said center William Karlsson, one of the three original so-called \u201cMisfits\u201d who are still around from the beginning. \u201cThat came out of nowhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

First general manager George McPhee plucking Karlsson, defensemen Shea Theodore and Brayden McNabb and winger Reilly Smith \u2014 back after a year and a half absence \u2014 from other teams put Vegas in position to succeed. Smart selections in the draft, free agent signings and trades by McPhee and now-GM Kelly McCrimmon established a standard of winning at all costs.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s what you want to be as an athlete,\u201d McNabb said. \u201cYou want to be on a team that does that.\u201d<\/p>\n

In came Mark Stone, Jack Eichel, Ivan Barbashev and Alex Pietrangelo, and the Knights won the Cup in their sixth season. They\u2019ve only missed the playoffs once.<\/p>\n

What has been different for the Golden Knights<\/p>\n

Pietrangelo\u2019s career-ending injury opened space to deal for Mitch Marner on June 30. Marner leads all scorers in the playoffs with 21 points, succeeding at a time of year that he never did in nearly a decade with the Toronto Maple Leafs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think our team is deeper and a better team than what he had played on in Toronto,\u201d McCrimmon said. \u201cNot that Toronto didn\u2019t have real good teams, but you have to have that depth throughout your roster because to go through three rounds or ultimately, hopefully, four rounds, everybody\u2019s got to take their turn.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pavel Dorofeyev has been a breakout star on that front, and he and teammate Brett Howden are tied for the most postseason goals with 10 apiece. Karlsson returned in the second round after missing the previous six months with an undisclosed injury.<\/p>\n

Goaltender Carter Hart, a controversial signing last fall after he and four other Hockey Canada junior players were acquitted of sexual assault, has rounded into form. Hart stopped 118 of 125 shots in a West final sweep of Colorado.<\/p>\n

And, most notably, Vegas has won 19 of 24 games since McCrimmon fired coach Bruce Cassidy in late March and hired John Tortorella, whom he had never met or spoken with before.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe asked ourselves, \u2018Who can come in and give us that kind of a bump?’\u201d McCrimmon said. \u201cJohn was the guy that we really felt strongly could do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Josh Jacobs practicing with Packers again while prosecutors consider whether to file charges<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) \u2014 Rod Brind’Amour knows the exact moment he realized the Carolina Hurricanes could be Stanley Cup contenders. “Eight years ago,” he said. That was when Brind’Amour took over as coach, beginning a journey of making the playoffs every year and falling short of the final each time until now. The Vegas Golden […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2227,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nCarolina, Vegas rugged and rolling as they open a Stanley Cup Final nearly a decade in the making - Raleigh Moving News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/raleighmovingnews.com\/?p=2228\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Carolina, Vegas rugged and rolling as they open a Stanley Cup Final nearly a decade in the making - Raleigh Moving News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) \u2014 Rod Brind’Amour knows the exact moment he realized the Carolina Hurricanes could be Stanley Cup contenders. “Eight years ago,” he said. That was when Brind’Amour took over as coach, beginning a journey of making the playoffs every year and falling short of the final each time until now. 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