The Vegas Golden Knights (49-22-10) will square off against the Minnesota Wild (45-30-7) in the first round of the 2025 Stanley Cup Playoffs, which are set to begin this weekend.
The Golden Knights will have home-ice advantage after locking up the Pacific Division title for the fourth time in eight seasons. Vegas secured the No. 2 seed in the conference with a point Tuesday night against Calgary, thus ensuring home-ice advantage through at least the first two rounds and against every team in the West except Winnipeg.
The Wild clinched the first wildcard seed Tuesday night after earning a point against the Anaheim Ducks. Minnesota trailed 2-1 late but tied the game with 21 seconds left to force overtime; the Wild went on to win in overtime on a goal by Matt Boldy.
Marc-Andre Fleury replaced Filip Gustavsson to start extra time and stopped all five shots he faced for win No. 575 in the final regular season game of his career. Fleury announced earlier this year that he will retire at the end of this season; he is expected to be Minnesota’s backup in the playoffs.
Minnesota concluded the 2024-25 campaign with 97 points, one more than the St. Louis Blues, who will play the top-seeded Winnipeg Jets. The other two matchups will see Dallas host Colorado and Los Angeles host Edmonton.
Vegas swept this year’s three-game season series against the Wild, though Minnesota was without superstar Kirill Kaprizov in two of those matchups.
This will be the second postseason matchup between these clubs, who also went head-to-head in the first round of the 2021 postseason. The Golden Knights won the series in seven games, with Mattias Janmark recording a hat trick in Game 7. Vegas went on to defeat Colorado in six games before falling to Montreal in the third round.