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LAS VEGAS — The day it was announced Las Vegas was getting an NHL team. The way that team became a symbol of a city that was in pain before the Golden Knights even played a game. The big trades that saw them get the stars who have built their win-at-all-costs mentality.

Moments such as these have defined the Vegas Golden Knights. And with Tuesday marking the sixth anniversary of their first game, those events were instrumental when they raised their first Stanley Cup banner before taking a 4-1 win against the Seattle Kraken at T-Mobile Arena.

“It was cool seeing the banner go up,” Golden Knights goaltender Adin Hill said. “I hadn’t seen a banner with that much detail before. It was pretty cool to see it go up but we know what we did last year, and we were ready to go tonight.”

Like so many Golden Knights games, the ceremony began with the team leaning into its medieval theme. The videoboard displayed pictures of the team winning the Stanley Cup that were made to look like something from an epic fantasy, complete with narration suitable for a Shakespearean play.

Then came Lee Orchard, who plays the role of the “Golden Knight,” skating onto the ice and donning his golden armor before placing his sword in a stone at center ice.

From there, the arena’s collective attention returned to the videoboard, where fans watched the history of the Golden Knights through video clips. It started with the board of governors meeting when it was announced Las Vegas would get a team, followed by clips of the expansion draft.

The video then went to the numerous memorials that were displayed around Las Vegas from the Route 91 Harvest music festival shooting that occurred Oct. 1, 2017. The Golden Knights honored the victims and first responders before their first home game nine days later. Tuesday’s video featured excerpts from the emotional speech delivered that evening by former Golden Knights defenseman Deryk Engelland, who said, “We’ll do anything we can to help you and our city heal.”

The video continued by showing the day the team named Mark Stone captain followed by players the Golden Knights either signed or acquired in a trade, including Jack Eichel. It showed a clip from coach Bruce Cassidy’s introductory news conference and a series of goals from last season.

While the video then started playing highlights from the Stanley Cup playoff run, on-ice crew members rolled out the banner box — a slot machine.

“I had a feeling the three Cups were coming,” Eichel said. “It’s Vegas so it’s to theme. I loved it. It was great.”

After the video ended, the team took the ice, with Stone being the last to join as he hoisted the Stanley Cup over his shoulders while skating around the rink. He then set the Cup on a table next to the slot machine and pulled the lever.

Three Stanley Cup icons were displayed on the three LCD screens, and the banner slowly came out of the box and was raised high enough for the crowd to see.

Once the Golden Knights took a team photo in front of the banner, it was raised to the rafters. The booming speakers of the public address system played “Shot at the Night” by famed Las Vegas natives The Killers as the banner made its way to the rafters.

Many of the Golden Knights looked longingly at the banner, and a few appeared to get emotional before the ceremony ended with a chant of “Go Knights Go” by the sellout crowd.

“We had our ring dinner a few nights ago and went to the Raiders last night,” Eichel said. “There’s a lot of things going on in your life and you’re trying to enjoy what we accomplished but prepare for a season, so, you try to balance both. It’s an amazing experience to watch a banner go up and you want to enjoy every moment. But in the back of your mind, you’re preparing for a game as well.”

How the Golden Knights would celebrate the most significant moment in their history had been surrounded by curiosity. The team’s entertainment staff instantly made T-Mobile Arena one of the most unique venues in the league by living up to the expectations that come with being in Las Vegas.

The Golden Knights have developed trademark touches such as Orchard skating around in golden armor, the Golden Belles showgirls team and the Knight Line — the team’s drum line — having one of its members rappel down from the rafters and onto the ice while still drumming.

Andrew Abrams, who is the Golden Knights’ vice president and executive producer for their entertainment team, said meeting those demands was “both hard and easy” when it came to what they would do for the banner-raising ceremony.

“We always try to sort of one-up ourselves, and the expectation is that it can’t be another hockey team doing another banner raising,” Abrams said. “But it was easy, because some of the elements that we chose, we actually had ideas for back in the playoffs before we could even talk about a banner ceremony.”

Tyler Ferraro, who is the Golden Knights’ senior manager of entertainment experience, said they wanted to make the ceremony about the team. Instead of solely tapping into those familiar trademarks, they wished to create what Ferraro described as a love letter from the team to the city.

It’s why they wanted to have items such as the slot machine banner box — something that was kept secret, with only a few select people in the organization knowing about it.

“We wanted to have a few things that when people looked at it, they said, ‘Yeah, that’s Vegas,'” Abrams said.

Reaching that conclusion also meant watching what other teams did in the NHL, along with other leagues, before confirming the direction the Golden Knights wanted to take.

Last year, the Colorado Avalanche had Blink-182 bassist and singer Mark Hoppus lead the crowd in singing “All the Small Things” — the 2000 hit song that eventually morphed into the team’s anthem, with fans continuing to sing well after the song stopped playing over the arena’s public address system.

Abrams said the Golden Knights’ entertainment team thought about different ideas such as possibly bringing in a musical act. But factors such as time restraints led to it keeping the focus on ceremony.

“Because we are such a young team, throughout the last six years, you can pinpoint specific points in our timeline of how this led to our championship,” Ferraro said. “Or how this trade fed into this thing that gave us the Stanley Cup.”

Another element the entertainment team worked with was when owner Bill Foley issued the famed “Cup in Six” edict in which he claimed the club would win a Stanley Cup in six seasons.

“It feels like a really beautiful endcap to our first Golden Knights saga,” Ferraro said. “We’re able to close a chapter on that, literally and figuratively, and we start focusing on the future, but that was a fun creative twist, as well.”

Even though the Golden Knights had months to work on creating what they deemed to be the perfect ceremony, they had a rather limited window to rehearse at T-Mobile Arena. The arena hosted Game 1 of the WNBA Finals between the New York Liberty and the defending champion Las Vegas Aces on Sunday. On Monday, the Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Lakers played a preseason game, which further heightened the need to make the most out of rehearsals.

Abrams said the first time they rehearsed the show was Oct. 4. The first rehearsal allowed them to see how the show looked in segments, but they didn’t have enough time to see how the whole ceremony would look start to finish.

Two days later, they were able to get back into T-Mobile because of an unforeseen opening in the schedule, which allowed them to rehearse four or five times.

“We walked out of there in a really good spot,” Abrams said. “A two-day rehearsal is not normal, but the important thing is we got as many reps as physically possible.”

Having a nostalgic ceremony also allowed a former Golden Knights player to look back, with Kraken forward Pierre-Edouard Bellemare talking about his time with the team. Bellemare, who spoke after morning skate, was one of the original Golden Knights who helped them reach the Stanley Cup Final that they lost to the Washington Capitals.

“You’re kind of proud, first of all, to be able to have the honor to be part of [that first team in franchise history],” Bellemare said. “Second of all, for the people of Vegas, you’re happy for everyone who is able to celebrate that.”

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Sources: Knights land Marner, give star 8 years

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Sources: Knights land Marner, give star 8 years

Mitch Marner was traded to the Vegas Golden Knights — with an eight-year extension in place, sources told ESPN on Monday. Forward Nicolas Roy will go to the Toronto Maple Leafs in return.

Marner’s new deal has a $12 million average annual value, according to sources. Marner, 28, was the biggest name entering Tuesday’s NHL free agency, and multiple teams were hoping to make pitches. Marner was the NHL’s fifth-leading scorer last season with 102 points — 36 more than the next-closest free agent. The winger was drafted by his hometown Maple Leafs with the No. 4 pick in 2015.

The Maple Leafs knew that Marner was looking to test free agency at the end of the season. Over the past few days, Toronto worked with Vegas, which was Marner’s preferred destination, on a trade. The Maple Leafs held Marner’s rights until just before midnight Tuesday.

Had Marner become an unrestricted free agent, he couldn’t have signed a deal for more than seven years.

Marner finished a six-year deal that paid him $10.9 million annually. Marner, who played for Team Canada at Four Nations and likely will make their Olympic team, has 221 goals and 741 points in nine NHL seasons.

Toronto general manager Brad Treliving has stayed busy this week, re-signing John Tavares and Matthew Knies while trading for Utah forward Matias Maccelli earlier Monday.

Roy, 28, is a center who is entering Year 4 of a five-year deal that pays him $3 million annually.

Ahead of the Marner trade, the Golden Knights created cap space by sending defenseman Nicolas Hague to the Nashville Predators on Monday.

The deal makes Marner the highest-paid player on Vegas, however, center Jack Eichel ($10 million AAV) is entering the final year of his contract and is eligible to sign an extension this summer. The Golden Knights might not be done this offseason. According to sources, defenseman Alex Pietrangelo is expected to go on long-term injured reserve, which could create more flexibility.

Sign-and-trades ahead of free agency are becoming a trend for NHL teams that know they will not sign their coveted player; last season, the Carolina Hurricanes dealt Jake Guentzel‘s rights to the Tampa Bay Lightning before he signed a seven-year deal.

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Sources: Panthers keeping Marchand, Ekblad

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Sources: Panthers keeping Marchand, Ekblad

Hours after re-signing Aaron Ekblad, the Florida Panthers kept another integral piece of their Stanley Cup team by re-signing Brad Marchand to a six-year contract extension, sources told ESPN’s Emily Kaplan.

Marchand’s deal has an average annual value of $5.25 million, sources told Kaplan.

Coming to terms with Ekblad on an eight-year extension worth $6.1 million annually left the Panthers with what PuckPedia projected to be $4.9 million in salary cap space.

There was the possibility that Marchand, 37, could have left the Panthers for a more lucrative offer elsewhere considering there were teams that had more than enough cap space to sign him.

Instead? Marchand, who arrived ahead of the NHL trade deadline from the Boston Bruins, appears as if he will remain in South Florida for the rest of his career.

Acquiring defenseman Seth Jones from the Chicago Blackhawks and then adding Marchand were two decisions made by Panthers general manager Bill Zito with the intent of seeing the Panthers win a second consecutive Stanley Cup as part of a run that now has included three straight Cup Final appearances.

Marchand, who was a pending UFA entering the final day before free agency begins Tuesday, used the 2025 postseason to further cement why the Panthers and other teams throughout the NHL would still seek his services. He scored 10 goals and finished with 20 points in 23 playoff games.

For all the contributions he made, his greatest came during the Cup Final series against the Edmonton Oilers.

Marchand, who previously won a Cup with the Bruins back in 2011, opened the series with a goal in the first three games. That includes the two goals he scored in the Panthers’ 5-4 double-overtime win to tie the series with his second being the game-winning salvo.

He scored two more goals in a 5-2 win in Game 5 that allowed the Panthers to take a 3-1 series lead before returning to Sunrise, Florida, where they closed out the series with an emphatic 5-1 win.

Capturing a consecutive title created questions about whether the Panthers can win a third in a row. But there was the understanding that it might be difficult given there was only so much salary cap space to re-sign Conn Smythe winner Sam Bennett, Ekblad and Marchand.

Knowing there was a chance they could lose one, or more, of them, Zito laid the foundation to retain the trio. He began by signing Bennett to an eight-year contract worth $8 million annually on June 27 before using Monday to sign Ekblad and Marchand.

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Sources: Provorov nets 7-year deal from Jackets

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Sources: Provorov nets 7-year deal from Jackets

Ivan Provorov decided to forgo free agency, with the veteran defenseman finalizing a seven-year extension Monday worth $8.5 million annually to remain with the Columbus Blue Jackets, sources told ESPN, confirming earlier reports.

With free agency slated to start Tuesday, the 28-year-old was one of the most notable defenseman who had a chance to hit the open market.

Provorov’s decision to stay with the Blue Jackets comes shortly after it was reported that Aaron Ekblad also avoided free agency by agreeing to an eight-year extension to remain with the Florida Panthers. That now leaves players such as Vladislav Gavrikov, Ryan Lindgren, and Dmitry Orlov among the more prominent pending UFAs who could be available should they fail to strike a deal with their current teams.

Retaining Provorov comes months after a season that witnessed the Blue Jackets shed the title of being a rebuilding franchise to one that could challenge for the playoffs in 2025-26.

Four consecutive seasons without the playoffs created the idea that the 2024-25 campaign could be another challenging one. But a six-game winning streak in January saw Columbus post a 22-17-6 record to create the belief that a turnaround could be in order.

The Jackets closed the season with another six-game winning streak but fell short of the final Eastern Conference wild-card playoff spot, which went to the Montreal Canadiens by two points.

Provorov would finish with seven goals and 33 points in 82 games while his 23 minutes, 21 seconds in average ice time was second behind Norris Trophy finalist Zach Werenski.

Re-signing Provorov comes in an offseason that saw the Blue Jackets also strengthen their bottom-six forward corps by adding Charlie Coyle and Miles Wood in a trade with the Colorado Avalanche.

PuckPedia projects that the Blue Jackets now have $20.957 million in cap space ahead of free agency.

TSN was first to report news of Provorov’s decision.

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