Stanley Cup Playoffs Day 42: Golden Knights blow out Stars in Game 6 to advance to Stanley Cup Final

The Vegas Golden Knights are on their way to the Stanley Cup Final to face the Florida Panthers after a 6-0 blowout of the Dallas Stars in Game 6. The Stars fought valiantly to push this series beyond the 3-0 deficit they initially faced, but four wins in a row against the same team is a tough feat, especially with your backs against the wall, and Vegas was the eventual victor in the Western Conference Final.

Much like most of this series, it was the Golden Knights getting off to the hot start by dominating the play, and they were rewarded with the first goal of the game. Just 3:41 into the first period, Keegan Kolesar’s work along the boards resulted in the puck going into the slot right on William Carrier’s stick, and after a couple moves around Jake Oettinger, he buried it into the wide open net.

However, the issue for Vegas in these past two games was that they let the game get away from them after that first goal. But, Esa Lindell got penalized midway through the first for sending the puck over the glass, and the Golden Knights had a power play attempt to change that this game.

And change that they did. A Reilly Smith shot was deflected on net, and William Karlsson was there to bury the rebound, and with his ninth goal of the playoffs, he set a new Golden Knights franchise record for goals in a playoff season.

The fourth line went to work again a few minutes later, as Kolesar sent a zone entry pass to Carrier and bolted for the net, where Carrier set Kolesar up on the 2-on-1 to score and make it 3-0 before the end of the first period. It was outright domination in the first for Vegas, outshooting Dallas 16-7 and having the edge in 5v5 scoring chances at 14-3 and 5v5 expected goals at 1.3-0.19.

The Stars started to pressure in the second period, getting a plethora of chances, but Adin Hill stood strong and kept the lead at three goals for Vegas. That helped put the game out of reach even more, as Ivan Barbashev set up Jonathan Marchessault on the rush, who showed some slick hands to score and give the Golden Knights the 4-0 lead.

And if there was any doubt that the Stars were going to come back in the third period, Vegas removed that early on, as just 2:06 into the period, Michael Amadio had a partial breakaway but opted to drop pass to a wide open Karlsson, who sniped home his second of the night to make it 5-0. Amadio was then rewarded with a goal of his own 10 minutes later, with Karlsson setting him up in front of the net to make it 6-0, and that held for the final score.

The Golden Knights bottom six lines feasted on the Stars in this game, with Karlsson leading the way with two goals and an assist, and then Amadio, Kolesar, and Carrier all with a goal and an assist, and Smith with two assists. Adin Hill was solid with the 23-save shutout, but he had plenty of runway in this game to secure the win with the goal support he got.

With the series win, the Golden Knights advance to the Stanley Cup Final for the second time in their franchise’s history, with the first coming in their inaugural season in 2018 where they lost in five games to the Washington Capitals. They’ll face the Florida Panthers, who swept their Conference Final series against the Carolina Hurricanes, and both will be vying for their first Stanley Cup win in franchise history.

For the Stars, they enter an offseason with a bit over $7 million in cap space, although they don’t have any major free agents to re-sign outside of trade deadline additions like Max Domi and Evgenii Dadonov, even with Roope Hintz’s contract extension with an $8.45 million cap hit kicking in next season.