The Vegas Golden Knights were eliminated from the 2025 Stanley Cup Playoffs on Wednesday night after suffering a 1-0 overtime loss in Game 5 of their second-round series against the Edmonton Oilers. The Oilers won the series 4-1 to advance to the Western Conference Final for the second year in a row; they will play the winner of the Dallas-Winnipeg series.
It was a disappointing finish for the Golden Knights, who had high expectations after a first-round exit last year against the Stars. Despite extensive roster turnover in the offseason, the Golden Knights bounced back with an impressive 2024-25 campaign in which they reached the 50-win threshold, set franchise and individual records and showed tremendous potential.
They won the Pacific Division title for the fourth time in eight seasons and were near the top of the standings all year, setting a franchise record with 274 goals in 82 games. Vegas had the best power play in franchise history (28.3 percent), Jack Eichel recorded a franchise-record 94 points, Pavel Dorofeyev and Tomas Hertl led the team in goals with a combined 67, 27 of which came on the man-advantage (Hertl’s 14 were the most in franchise history), and many additional players set personal bests.
From that perspective, it was somewhat reminiscent of the inaugural campaign.
Shea Theodore set franchise records for most assists (50) and points (57) by a defenseman in a season, both of which were career highs. Brett Howden set career highs with 23 goals and 40 points, and Keegan Kolesar had a career-best 12 goals, 18 assists, 30 points and three game-winning goals.
Vegas had five players with more than 20 goals, including Dorofeyev (35), Hertl (32), Eichel (28), Howden (23) and Ivan Barbashev (23). Thirteen different players reached double digits in goals, and eight managed more than 15, including Mark Stone (19), Victor Olofsson (15) and Nicolas Roy (15). Tanner Pearson and Noah Hanifin also lit the lamp frequently, recording 13 and 10 goals, respectively.
Also, Adin Hill set a career high in wins (32), going 32-13-5 with a 2.47 goals-against average, .906 save percentage and four shutouts.
Vegas’ performance in the postseason, however, fell far short of expectations and resulted in what felt like a premature ending to a promising season.
After winning three straight games to overcome a 2-1 deficit in the first round against the Minnesota Wild, Vegas managed just one win in round two, which came courtesy of Reilly Smith’s last-second goal in Game 3.
In the final two games of the series, the Golden Knights were completely held off the board, as Stuart Skinner recorded 47 saves to close out the series in five games. Skinner replaced Calvin Pickard for Game 3 of the matchup, and there were question marks surrounding his game after he surrendered 11 goals in two contests in the first round against Los Angeles. But Skinner held his own and ultimately slammed the door on the Golden Knights’ run.
The Golden Knights’ effort in Game 4 was suspect, and though they were more competitive in Game 5, they still managed just eight shots through the first 40 minutes of play. It wasn’t the convincing display of a team with championship ambitions. It was a tightly-checked contest, and the Golden Knights didn’t give up much defensively, but it was far from a showcase of grit, relentless determination or dominance.
At the end of the day, Vegas needed just one goal to win the game, extend the series and save their season. But the fifth-ranked offense from the regular season couldn’t manage a single goal in the final 127:19:04 of action.
It wasn’t just the lack of scoring that doomed Vegas, however. In fact, there were a lot of things that went wrong for the Golden Knights along the way.
One popular talking point has been and will be the lack of call on the Brayden McNabb trip in overtime of Game 2. It was clearly a penalty, and it should have been called. The timing of the incident made it particularly egregious because it preceded Edmonton’s 2-on-1 that ended the game.
However, the Golden Knights were not one call away from winning this series.
Would a power play at that point in the game and series have helped? Yes. Even if the Golden Knights didn’t score, Leon Draisaitl wouldn’t have scored the game-winner at that time.
Could it have turned the tide in the series? Certainly.
But that doesn’t mean it was the single difference between Vegas winning and losing the series. The Golden Knights proved throughout the series that there were fundamental flaws in their game and that they were not playing anything resembling championship hockey.
After a shaky opening round, it was reasonable to assume the Golden Knights would put it all together and step up their game. That’s how it looked at the start of Game 1, as Vegas scored two goals in the first period and appeared well on its way to capitalizing on home-ice advantage. Instead, the Oilers rallied to take Game 1 and then did the same in Game 2. Edmonton rallied in Game 3 but was outdone by Smith’s heroic buzzer-beater. Edmonton never trailed the rest of the way.
In reality, Vegas never managed to play 60 minutes of Golden Knights hockey. There were too many areas of concern, and the Oilers had no trouble exploiting Vegas’ weaknesses.
So while the non-call on McNabb is a fair and reasonable point of contention, it should not serve as an explanation to excuse or dismiss every other reason the Golden Knights did not prevail.
Here are five of those reasons the Golden Knights fell short in their pursuit of the Cup and were eliminated by the Oilers.
Stars didn’t shine
It is often said that a team’s best players need to be the team’s best players when the games mean the most. In the Edmonton series, the Golden Knights’ top players did not deliver.
Vegas’ five leading scorers in the regular season were Eichel (28-66—94), Stone (19-48—67), Hertl, (32-29—61), Theodore (7-50—57) and Dorofeyev (35-17—52).
Eichel had five assists in the first three games of the second round before Vegas was held off the scoresheet in Games 4 and 5; he finished the series with zero goals, 11 shots and a minus-four rating. Stone had four points in the first two games before getting injured in Game 3, playing hurt in Game 4 and missing Game 5. Hertl and Dorofeyev had zero points in the series (Dorofeyev played in just three of five games), while Theodore had one assist.
Needless to say, the players the Golden Knights relied on for production in the regular season did not come through against the Oilers.
Head coach Bruce Cassidy discussed this prior to Game 5.
“It’s time,” Cassidy said. “That’s part of getting our offense going. The guys you’ve relied on all year to consistently produce, it’s time to produce.”
But it didn’t happen.
The Golden Knights scored 10 total goals in five games and recorded a total of 120 shots, with 104 of them getting blocked and 81 missing the net, according to NHL.com. Hertl led the team with 12 shots, while Eichel had 11 and Olofsson had 10.
The Golden Knights declined way too many opportunities to shoot, particularly in the two shutout losses. As a result, neither Oilers goalie was ever thoroughly tested.
“We’re a team that’s not a shoot-first team anyway, so that’s something obviously we’ll look at,” Cassidy said. “I think it cost us a little last year, too, lack of production in the Dallas series, so we have to look if we have to change our mindset a little bit.”
Out of their depth
The Golden Knights didn’t get enough production from their star players, but they also didn’t get nearly enough contributions from the depth. In fact, the Oilers’ depth far outplayed Vegas’.
Connor McDavid and Draisaitl managed six points apiece but were both contained, primarily by the defensive play of William Karlsson (in the case of McDavid, in particular). But because of the depth, the Oilers didn’t need to rely on their best players to win four out of five games.
Corey Perry — who played multiple games on the top line but was not a key contributor during the regular season — recorded three goals and four points; Evander Kane scored two goals and added two assists; Adam Henrique scored two goals, both of which came in the first period of Game 4; Connor Brown scored a goal; Darnell Nurse and Vasily Podkolzin scored a goal and added an assist; and Jake Walman and Kasperi Kapanen each scored a goal, with Kapanen netting the series-clincher.
For the Golden Knights, four different forwards scored two goals, including Stone, Smith, Karlsson and Olofsson. Alex Pietrangelo and Roy accounted for the other two Vegas goals in the series.
Among players who skated in at least two games, six different Golden Knights players recorded zero points in the series, including Hertl, Barbashev, Howden, Brandon Saad (who played two games), Pearson and Dorofeyev. Kolesar recorded zero goals and one assist, while Roy scored one goal and added zero helpers.
The Golden Knights had way too many players serving as passengers, which proved quite costly as the club struggled to find the back of the net.
Nothing but net-front
The most polarizing topic of debate regarding the Golden Knights’ early exit is likely to be Adin Hill, who finished the series 1-4 with a 3.03 goals-against average and .893 save percentage.
Was Hill as good as he needed to be? Absolutely not.
Was he as good as he was expected to be? No.
Did he give his team a chance to win? Yes.
Hill was far from perfect, and he gave up a number of uncharacteristically soft goals throughout the postseason. For example, the Podkolzin and Nurse goals in Game 2 were terrible.
He was definitely a factor. Goaltending should have been a major advantage for Vegas; it didn’t play out that way.
But when a team doesn’t score a goal in the final two games of a series, it’s difficult to put all of the blame on the goalie.
He wasn’t nearly sharp enough in the early games when Vegas blew multiple leads, and he was one of Vegas’ star players who wasn’t good enough.
That being said, in the final two games of the series, Hill recorded a 1.96 goals-against average with a .938 save percentage. In the elimination game, he shut out the opponent for 67 minutes. He also turned aside all eight shots on the five-minute major in overtime of Game 2, and he was a key contributor on a fantastic penalty kill.
But it’s difficult to criticize Hill and ignore the fact that the Golden Knights played poorly in front of him. Playing well at the net-front is a point of emphasis for Cassidy, but it was not a strength for Vegas in this series.
Edmonton got behind the Vegas defense, went to the crease, won battles and put the puck in the net.
A huge component of Vegas’ Cup run was the big, heavy and punishing blue line that made life miserable for opponents looking to go to the net. That wasn’t part of Vegas’ game against the Oilers.
Take the final two games, for example.
Both of Henrique’s first-period tallies in Game 4 came from in front of the net.
Kapanen’s game-winner — the lone goal of Game 5 — was scored from around the crease, as he got around Vegas’ defense, won a battle and shoved the puck into the net.
That doesn’t mean Hill is blameless; he’s not. But the Golden Knights didn’t protect the front of the net, and it cost them. At the very least, it needs to be part of the discussion when evaluating Hill.
Vegas also played poorly in front of Edmonton’s net.
For much of the series, the Golden Knights weren’t able to get shots through, couldn’t force Skinner or Pickard to move laterally and had trouble getting to the inside.
When Vegas did get to the front of the net or found open space in the slot, good things happened.
The first goal of the series was a deflection on the power play, and it came after Stone went to the net. His second goal that period came when he weaved his way into the slot and beat Skinner.
In Game 2, there were two Golden Knights skaters in front of the net on Karlsson’s tip play, and Pietrangelo’s game-tying shot in the third period was screened.
In Game 3, Roy scored on a rebound in front of Skinner, Smith drove to the net and beat Skinner for his first of the game, Karlsson scored on a give-and-go from the side of the net, and Smith’s game-winner involved Smith driving to the net.
Almost every Vegas goal was scored around the net or with bodies in front of the crease. But the Oilers made changes defensively, and Vegas failed to adjust. Then the offense disappeared.
In the end, Edmonton did an excellent job clogging the middle of the ice, and it’s a big reason why the Golden Knights’ offense was limited so substantially.
Five-on-five play
Interestingly, the Golden Knights won the special teams battle 3-1, and the Golden Knights’ penalty kill was one of the few bright spots of the series. Killing off the Roy major in Game 2 was massive, and the Golden Knights went 10-for-11 in the series.
The power play, on the other hand, let Vegas down. The Golden Knights had three opportunities in the first period of Game 4, and after going 3-for-7 in the first two games, Vegas went 0-for-6 in the final three.
Unexpectedly, however, it was 5-on-5 play that plagued Vegas.
When these teams played each other in the second round in 2023, McDavid recorded five goals and five assists, while Draisaitl chipped in six goals and seven points. Nine of those 17 combined points came on the man-advantage. The Golden Knights won that series because of their 5-on-5 play.
This time, however, the Golden Knights couldn’t generate nearly enough at 5-on-5. In fact, the Oilers outscored Vegas 15-7 at 5-on-5, with 10 different Oilers scoring.
Wasted advantages
The Golden Knights had their chances to win this series. That’s not to take credit away from the Oilers, who made adjustments, had a gameplan and executed. But the Golden Knights failed to capitalize far too frequently.
In Game 4, Vegas had three power plays in the first period but failed to even cut the 2-0 deficit in half, recording just two total shots.
Vegas blew leads in each of the first three games, with Games 1 and 2 resulting in losses. The Golden Knights led 2-0 nine minutes into the first period of the series. They gave up a goal in that period but carried a 2-1 lead into the second intermission. Edmonton scored less than a minute into the third to tie the game, and the Oilers proceeded to add two more in that frame.
In Game 2, the Golden Knights scored the first goal but gave up three goals in a disastrous second period. It was a 3-2 game going into the third, but Vegas surrendered a goal less than two minutes in. However, Vegas managed to tie the game to force overtime. The Golden Knights had plenty of chances late in regulation and early in overtime but couldn’t convert. The missed call on Viktor Arvidsson hurt, but the Golden Knights needed to find a way to pull off that win.
But aside from being unable to hold leads, the Golden Knights also couldn’t extend them. The Oilers entered the series with four consecutive come-from-behind wins, so it was no secret to Vegas that Edmonton would not be fazed by a minor deficit. But the Golden Knights didn’t give themselves more breathing room, and the Oilers made them pay.
Vegas also went 0-3 at T-Mobile Arena after fighting so hard in the regular season to get home-ice advantage. The Golden Knights were one of the best teams in the league at home, but that wasn’t the case in this series.
Losing Game 2 after killing the major was a turning point in the series, and it was the kind of game that probably would have gone differently in 2023. That year, the tight games that could have gone either way typically went Vegas’ way (i.e., the overtime games against Dallas). This was just not that kind of year.