(Photo Credit: @_jkarsh on Instagram)
If you plan on traveling over the next few weeks, be prepared to chit-chat about the 2023 Stanley Cup champions. From the West Coast, Midwest, and Northeast, the Golden Knights Cup run has become a common conversation among sports fans.
I just don’t understand how a team can be so competitive and capture a Stanley Cup in six seasons. It’s mind-boggling to me that my team hasn’t been able to put together something so impressive like Vegas has. Maybe, we needed that coach behind our bench. -Dennis McCaul, Connecticut native & NY Rangers fan
At this moment Vegas fans cannot understand what it’s like to go through decade-long droughts like Islanders, Rangers, or Canadiens fans have gone through since before the turn of the century. Albeit all three clubs are massively popular with their fanbase, but to them it’s still a failure of a season if their team wasn’t the last one standing.
Local fans were introduced to a winning culture from the first puck drop of their 2017-18 inaugural season (“We played Arizona, and we beat the shit out of them”), but the Golden Knights didn’t take center stage in the sports world like they have now. Winning a championship brings more attention, more out-of-town observers, and more jealousy. While Ranger fans are frustrated with their team’s disappointing season, they were entertained and impressed with Vegas’ five-game Stanley Cup accomplishment.
I’m not sure why I cared. I was so pissed off by the Bruins performance I stopped watching the playoffs. Towards the middle of the conference finals I started paying attention again and the Golden Knights were the team I was rooting for. Obviously, Cassidy was a big reason for that but I also enjoyed watching the players on the team. They played like a team. Really, what I expected from the Bruins. Don’t even get me started, but overall I was glad to see Vegas win. -Jim Selvitella, Massachusetts native and Bruins fan
Specifically, Boston fans felt a connection to the Golden Knights because of their respect for former Bruins coach Bruce Cassidy. Many B’s fans have convinced themselves that if Cassidy hadn’t been let go in Boston, their team would’ve lifted their first Stanley Cup since 2011. Others were happy the coach won before their favorite team. That’s typical behavior from a fanbase with so much disdain for the Bruins brass. In their opinion, the wrong people were let go and Cassidy ended up being the scapegoat.
Overall, it’s been a mixed bag of emotions from mostly Eastern Conference hockey fans. You’ll notice more anger, frustration, and sourness from Western Conference and specifically Pacific Division fanbases. Outside of Miami-Dade County, East Coast fans are largely happy the Golden Knights became this season’s champions. The players, the coach, the theatrics. Vegas stole fans away from eliminated teams along their 2023 Stanley Cup chase. The bandwagon will likely end on opening night in October.
Michael Shevlane
Vegas winning is good for hockey. The Knights have taken the sports into a new realm (see what I did there?) with how they present the game, how much glamor they have added, and how well they have been managed.
And this is from an Avs fan (with a VGK wife and in-laws). Happy to hand off the Cup to VGK!
TS
Michael, thanks to you and your wife!! I always support a team from the West, and cheered for your AVS when the VGK were eliminated. The WEST has definitely caught up to the EAST, great to see!!!
Jailbird
Hey thanks Michael! I was glad the AVs ended TBs run last year. That’s two in a row for WC. I think the east is finally realizing we have some really good teams out here. I think the Knights, Colorado and Edmonton all have a good shot at it next season!
HOCKEYDIVA
Many disappointed eastern conference fans began following the VGK….BRUINS fans who believed COACH CASSIDY should not have been fired, jumped on the VGK bandwagon. Our fan base is international as well. The whole province of SASKATCHEWAN in Canada adopted THE VGK as their own hockey team. I enjoyed reading news coverage from Canada that call us the SASKATCHEWAN VEGAS GOLDEN KNIGHTS
TS
AWESOME!!! It’s pretty cool to see fans from EVERYWHERE cheering for the VGK!! We are all so happy to have Coach Cassidy…What a GIFT!
Some here say we have no outside fans. That tourists all bet against us. Nonsense!!
Jailbird
That’s great! I’m sure you won’t hear that from the folks in Alberta, eh!
Emmanuel
I think the Cats fluky run threw a spanner in the works of the EC playoffs. That Boston team was DARN good!
THE hockey GOD
It is funny because in first two games in VEgas in finals almost all the people in the area were visitors (including a lawyer from Texas on Foley’s team). They all BET
on the panthers hoping to cash in on the big odds. One guy was from Canada, another couple from east coast, one guy was from Dallas. etc. They all left at end of second period.
THE hockey GOD
all except the Foley lawyer of course.
Jailbird
Too many star players on Boston, Toronto. Boston played to break that points record the last weeks of the season, not really getting tuned for playoffs. Teams with too many big name players often have problems in POs. These stars want to be the man, score the goals, be the hero. Sometimes working as one, and not as a team.
hdbiker7851
ONLY TEAMS win the CUP = individuals obviously help but that is as far as it goes.
TS
Boston pulled a VGK mgmt move, when they pulled the plug on Cassidy, after a single missed playoff year. One bad season. They panicked, then the knee- jerk reaction was to shed Cassidy. We snapped him up immediately, knowing what a GIFT Cassidy would be to the VGK. Our Mgmt showed patience this move, waiting for the RIGHT coach, RIGHT fit, and the result is VGK SC History.
Sorry, Boston. We now have the SC, under your former coach….and we absolutely LOVE the guy!!!!!
PATIENCE PAYS OFF.WE GOT OUR GUY. BRILLIANT!!!!
Pistol Pete
As brainy and good a coach as DeBoer is, management could not have been more shrewd in letting him go. Not just that he missed the playoffs, they correctly determined Vegas was not going to win a Cup with him. Cassidy was a brilliant move. Brilliant. All their biggest moves, Stone, Petro, Eichel, and Cassidy resulted in a winning the Cup in a scant six years. Best managed team in the league. And per McPhee, a lot of the credit goes to McCrimmon.
Can’t wait for the preseason. Bring out Dorofeyev, Brisson and Brabenec. Things are good for years to come here in Vegas. Think how many more years Eichel will be around for. Whereas one player a team does not make, with him here and the way he now plays both ends of the ice., he’ll help set an example for the younger players. Vegas’s identity is now the two way game–the inside. Get inside in the opponent’s end, defend the inside in your end.
TS
Pp, absolutely!! We have the BEST in the business, with Cassidy!!