The Carolina Hurricanes can win the Stanley Cup on Sunday night in Las Vegas. They take a 3-2 lead into Game 6 at T-Mobile Arena, one win away from their first championship in 20 years.
That is why this game lands with so much force now. The Hurricanes have won the past two games in the best-of-7 Stanley Cup Final, and Jordan Martinook put the feeling plainly, saying he has imagined lifting the Cup over his head millions of times since he was a little kid. The Stanley Cup will be in the building, and if Carolina closes it out, the wait that has stretched back to 2006 ends on the spot.
For Vegas, the math is simple and unforgiving. The Golden Knights need to win two straight to take the series, and they have not lost two in a row since mid-January. Brayden McNabb called it “what an opportunity” and said winning at home would give Vegas a chance to force Game 7. Teams with a 3-2 lead in the Stanley Cup Final are 27-18 in Game 6, and since 2012 they are 8-2, which leaves the Golden Knights chasing both history and form.
The task gets harder without William Karlsson. He will not play after sustaining what appeared to be a left arm injury in the second period of Game 5, removing one of Vegas’s most trusted defensive forwards and a key penalty-kill piece from a night when every shift matters. Karlsson has four points in the series and nine in 15 playoff games, but his absence also forces the Golden Knights to patch together work that is usually built on detail, discipline and pressure in front of their goalie.
That pressure falls heavily on Carter Hart, who entered Game 6 with an.856 save percentage and a 3.70 goals-against average, the first goalie in Stanley Cup Final history to allow at least four goals in each of the first five games of a series. Vegas needs a better performance from him and a more detailed effort in front of him, while the Hurricanes bring a power play that has clicked on 6 of 12 chances since the third period of Game 2. Mitch Marner said Vegas must attack right away and avoid sitting back, adding that it has been a big miss to lose Karlsson but that the group has lived through injuries all year and in the playoffs before.
That is the edge on the night in Las Vegas: Carolina has already shown it can close, going 3-0 in potential clinching games this postseason, while Vegas is trying to survive its first elimination test. If the Golden Knights cannot sharpen the start, protect Hart and replace what Karlsson normally gives them, the series ends Sunday. If they do, the Stanley Cup Final gets one more game.
