Talented, confident Knights looking for hunger versus Wild
LAS VEGAS In a town where the all-you-can-eat buffets are legendary and you can get a shrimp cocktail for less than at any hour of day or night the local hockey club s coach just wants his squad to be hungry We are less than two years removed from Bruce Cassidy directing the Vegas Golden Knights to the franchise s first Stanley Cup title in just its sixth season of existence having joined the NHL as an expansion club in When thinking about his company s latest foray into the playoffs and a first-round series versus the Minnesota Wild Cassidy couldn t help but reflect back on what they did in and the internal fire it takes to win postseason games He reported the hunger his club had two seasons ago led by a bunch of players and a coach that had never before reached the encounter s pinnacle is the difference-maker beyond the -game regular season That s kind of what we have to re-claim That requirements to be equal to the other unit unless you re way better Cassidy announced When you come into the playoffs it s teams that are not that different A few obviously have advantages over others but they re all good hockey teams So that hunger and competitiveness has to be at the top of the list Vegas finished the regular season with a - - record tops in the Pacific Division and second behind Winnipeg in the Western Conference Three of those wins came against the Wild But in their guests from Minnesota the Vegas coach sees several things his unit will need to counter and a likely advantage for the Golden Knights if the Wild take penalties I think they re good at keeping the puck out of their net and that s usually a product of not allowing the rush encounter to get going I think they re very good at suppressing rush chances and not giving you odd-man rushes or easy opportunities he noted You re going to have to get inside you re going to have to work and create your offense through O-zone play get on the power play that s an advantage They ve given up chosen goals on the PK But the rush match I think is what they re really good at For the Wild s part their coach raves about the size of the Vegas defenders and says that getting to the net might be Minnesota s biggest challenge if they are to pull off an upset and get to the second round something the Wild have not done since First and foremost they re a pretty strong defensive structure band John Hynes disclosed on Friday They have one of the bigger D-cores in the league and when you look at their defensive numbers they re a organization that is responsible without the puck From an offensive perspective they have high-end talent and they can hit you in multiple options The Knights offense is keyed by Jack Eichel the Hobey Baker winner from Boston University who languished in Buffalo early in his career then came to Vegas and was a cornerstone of the Stanley Cup run Despite missing five regular-season contests including one against the Wild he finished in the NHL s top statistically with goals and assists in games Eichel s lone hat trick of the season came on March at Xcel Ability Center in a - win over the Wild While preparing his club to face the Wild Cassidy commented that the first minutes of any playoff series is the classroom where you learn how the next three to six games are going to go I think the series starts after Event You see what you are a little bit and what they are and away we go I didn t see this coming I saw this coming yeah this is who they are Cassidy disclosed And then you start making a sparse adjustments and then you go along I can give them all they want on Minnesota They re going to give us all about Vegas But once you start playing you start to truly know and get into it So you ve got to be careful you don t overload I have learned that After a -win season the Knights are coming in as the confident favorite and their coach announced he s not trying to give them too much to think about regarding Kirill Kaprizov or Brock Faber or Filip Gustavsson We re going to play our event and let them adjust to us That s not a bad mindset Cassidy noted They want to play hockey They ve done it times this year They want to play Vegas Golden Knights hockey and they don t want to hear every detail about Minnesota Related Articles With healthcare comes confidence as Wild head to Vegas Buium seems to be inching closer to his NHL debut Wild bring pre-loaded playoff mettle to Vegas Wild Fleury s dramatic final win surprised even him and his coach High drama at the X as Eriksson Ek s late goal puts Wild in playoffs
