{"id":701429,"date":"2026-06-13T09:15:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T09:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/701429\/"},"modified":"2026-06-13T09:15:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T09:15:16","slug":"canes-close-in-on-stanley-cup-dylan-larkins-trade-list-expands-and-more-nhl-drama","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/701429\/","title":{"rendered":"Canes close in on Stanley Cup, Dylan Larkin\u2019s trade list expands and more NHL drama"},"content":{"rendered":"

Red Light newsletter\u00a0\ud83c\udfd2\u00a0| This is\u00a0The Athletic\u2019s\u00a0hockey\u00a0newsletter.\u00a0Sign up here<\/a>\u00a0to receive Red Light directly in your inbox.<\/p>\n

Good morning, hockey folks. So, the Stanley Cup could be handed out this weekend in Vegas \u2026 or perhaps we get a Game 7 on Wednesday? We can only hope.<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfc6 One Win AwayHurricanes 4, Golden Knights 2<\/p>\n

After four bonkers outings<\/a> to start the series, Game 5 was a little more predictable and playoff-like last night \u2014 on both sides \u2014 and it was the Carolina Hurricanes\u2019 second-period surge that proved the difference.<\/p>\n

After Pavel Dorofeyev put Vegas on the board 6:52 into the game by plinking the netcam on the power play, Carolina scored the game\u2019s next four goals unanswered. The Canes really didn\u2019t look back after Andrei Svechnikov\u2019s first of two power-play markers made it 2-1 with eight minutes left in the second.<\/p>\n

The Golden Knights had a decent push late<\/a>, but they weren\u2019t going to make up three goals on the Canes, who seemed to be on a mission these past two games.<\/p>\n

Now they head to Vegas full of confidence for Game 6 on Sunday, with the home team\u2019s season on the line and Carolina looking to win the franchise\u2019s second Stanley Cup.<\/p>\n

Fun fact: Carolina coach Rod Brind\u2019Amour could become the first person to win a Cup as a player and a coach with the same franchise since Toe Blake with the Canadiens way back in the 1960s.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s get contextualizing. Here\u2019s what our on-the-ground army of writers saw in Game 5:<\/p>\n

Hurricanes center Jordan Staal became the first player in 70 years<\/a> to open the Stanley Cup Final by scoring a goal in five consecutive games. Another huge goal<\/a> from the captain.
\nWith his offensive explosion, Staal is making the playoff MVP conversation interesting<\/a>. The 37-year-old would become the oldest winner in NHL history, too, surpassing Tim Thomas.
\nA serious William Karlsson injury<\/a>, Brandon Bussi winning the goaltending battle and more: Here are our key Game 5 takeaways<\/a>.
\nAre the Golden Knights in big trouble with the way the Hurricanes are playing? It sure looks like it<\/a>.
\nSvechnikov has had a fairly quiet postseason \u2014 until now. Mike Russo has a nice feature on the 26-year-old forward, the first high pick of this era of Hurricanes (No. 2 in 2018), finally breaking through in the biggest game of his career<\/a>.
\nIt might be Adin Hill time. Golden Knights netminder Carter Hart has struggled enough \u2014 with an .856 save percentage in this series \u2014 that Hill could be Vegas\u2019 best hope<\/a> to win the Cup.
\nIn the other net, the undrafted and claimed-off-waivers Bussi has become an amazing story<\/a> for Carolina, which somehow now has four goalies (?!) on the roster. \u201cHe obviously played a great game for us,\u201d Brind\u2019Amour said. (Park The Bus<\/a>, indeed.)
\n\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Will 37-year-old Jordan Staal win the Conn Smythe Trophy? (Bruce Bennett \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udca1 MirTrivia Question<\/p>\n

Staal scoring six goals in five games<\/a> in this series is incredible in several ways, but how about this stat? He has now tied the NHL record for most goals in a Stanley Cup Final for a player 37 or older.<\/p>\n

The player who set that record did it just last year. Who was it?<\/p>\n

Bonus: Only three other players 37 or older have ever had six-plus goals in any playoff series, and they did it with the Leafs, Ducks and Stars in the past 25 years. Can you name them?<\/p>\n

Answers at the bottom.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Darnell Nurse wants out. (Patrick Smith \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcf0\ud83d\udca5 Newsplosion<\/p>\n

If your team isn\u2019t playing, that\u2019s OK: We are exactly two weeks away from the NHL Draft and 19 days from the opening of free agency on July 1. The news cycle right now reflects just how much is going on behind the scenes for the 30 teams not playing games.<\/p>\n

Some highlights and lightning-round thoughts from happenings over just the past couple of days:<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udca5 Oilers\u2019 Darnell Nurse requests a trade<\/a><\/p>\n

Is any team going to be more interesting than the Oilers this offseason? There\u2019s the coach drama \u2014 with the Mike Babcock<\/a> and Bruce Cassidy<\/a> twin fiascos playing out during the Final \u2014 plus Connor McDavid entering year one of his two-year \u201cshow-me-the-contention\u201d deal.<\/p>\n

What are they going to do in goal after Tristan Jarry\u2019s massive struggles there? Can they get anything of note in return for Nurse, who has four years left on a contract with a problematic $9.25 million AAV? How do they fix the blue line without him?<\/p>\n

And will it all be enough for the Oilers to rejoin the contender ranks with so many up-and-coming young teams on the rise?<\/p>\n

\ud83e\udd14Dylan Larkin\u2019s trade list is expanding<\/a><\/p>\n

When speculation first leaked that Larkin, Detroit\u2019s captain, was willing to go only to Florida, Minnesota and Vegas, the backlash was tangible. Now, it appears that list was premature<\/a>. (Or they walked it back.)<\/p>\n

So, which teams need Larkin the most? And what could they offer? Max Bultman and Shayna Goldman break it down<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Color me intrigued by the idea of Anaheim or Philadelphia<\/a>, two of those young teams taking big steps forward, getting involved in these talks. Adding another significant piece down the middle could help get them into the contender conversation sooner than expected.<\/p>\n

Two more can\u2019t-miss stories: Chris Johnston\u2019s latest trade board, which lists Larkin at No. 1<\/a>. Plus, Red Wings GM Steve Yzerman might seem like he\u2019s backed into a corner, but he\u2019s gotten out of jams<\/a> like this before.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcdb Have these pending UFAs hurt their value<\/a>?<\/p>\n

With free agency so close, playoff performances from players heading to market will be fresh in general managers\u2019 minds come July.<\/p>\n

Shayna and Harman Dayal identify 10 players whose value has shifted the most<\/a>. A couple of players in particular caught my eye:<\/p>\n

Buffalo\u2019s Alex Tuch and Vegas\u2019 Rasmus Andersson have long been in the spotlight as two of the biggest names in this 2026 UFA class, but could an underwhelming postseason limit how much they end up getting? Or is this free-agent class so thin that everyone will get paid regardless? A lot of teams are flush with cash and eyeing big holes on their roster.<\/p>\n

Again, here\u2019s that 10-player list<\/a>. I\u2019m guessing we\u2019ll see a lot of contractual mistakes this summer due to the double whammy of a rising cap and a barren list of players on the market. That could be good news for Tuch and Andersson, regardless of their recent play.<\/p>\n

Coast to Coast<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfc6 Tampa\u2019s Nikita Kucherov won his second Hart Trophy on Thursday, narrowly beating out McDavid in one of the closest MVP votes<\/a> in NHL history. (My ballot had McDavid at No. 1 and Kucherov at No. 4, which shows just how tight the top of the race was.)<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udd75\ufe0f What exactly is the NHL investigating as it determines whether Babcock should be allowed to coach in the league again? Aaron Portzline explains the history of his brief, troubled time<\/a> in Columbus.<\/p>\n

\u26cf\ufe0f Prospector Corey Pronman has defenseman Chase Reid \u2014 not Gavin McKenna \u2014 ranked No. 1 in his latest draft rankings. Here\u2019s why<\/a>. Also, don\u2019t miss Pronman and fellow Athletic prospect expert Scott Wheeler duking it out<\/a> about the draft.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udca9 A surprising number of legendary hockey games have ended with a goal that was \u2026 iffy, questionable or downright terrible. What was the best game to be decided by the worst goal in hockey history? A Sean McIndoe investigation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcf0 Canucks GM Ryan Johnson sits down with The Athletic one-on-one to explain how he\u2019s approaching their scorched-earth rebuild<\/a>: \u201cThe landscape has certainly changed. It\u2019s not the way it used to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2705 Sergei Murashov sure feels like a name to watch in goaltending circles after his impressive .931 run in the AHL playoffs. Josh Yohe has more on the Penguins\u2019 likely \u2018tender of the future<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfa4 In the latest \u201cThe Athletic Hockey Show,\u201d Hailey Salvian and Max Bultman break down all the action from Game 5 of the Cup Final in podcast form. Watch or listen here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u2795 The PWHL is in Phase 3 of its six-phase expansion team roster-building process, and Hailey is keeping a running list of the signings<\/a>. This whole system<\/a> has been fascinating.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

\n Brad Marchand. (Leila Devlin \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n

MirTrivia Answer<\/p>\n

The graybeard player who had six goals at age 37-plus in last year\u2019s Cup Final? It was the Florida Panthers\u2019 Brad Marchand, who, like Staal, was 37 when he did it.<\/p>\n

And the bonus question of old guys who have had six-plus goals in a playoff series in any round: Steve \u201cStumpy\u201d Thomas in 2001 with Toronto, Teemu Selanne in 2011 with Anaheim and Joe Pavelski in 2023 with Dallas.<\/p>\n

A free round on DGB<\/a> for anyone who nailed all four of those.<\/p>\n

Have feedback, a correction or just want to tell us how much you love Red Light? Leave us a note in the comments or shoot us an email at redlight@theathletic.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\ud83d\udceb Love Red Light? Check out The Athletic\u2019s other newsletters<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Red Light newsletter\u00a0\ud83c\udfd2\u00a0| This is\u00a0The Athletic\u2019s\u00a0hockey\u00a0newsletter.\u00a0Sign up here\u00a0to receive Red Light directly in your inbox. Good morning, hockey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":701430,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[4821,385,99],"class_list":["post-701429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-carolina-hurricanes","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=701429"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701429\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/701430"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=701429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=701429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=701429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}