Hockey Wiretap

Vegas Golden Knights defenseman Brayden McNabb was taken to the hospital in the middle of Game 2 of the Stanley cup finals after he was hit in the face by an 87 mph puck.

McNabb was defending in front of Vegas goalie Carter Hart when Carolina Hurricanes forward Nikolaj Ehlers fired a shot from inside the blue line.

McNabb was holding his nose as he left the ice.

Defenseman Jeremy Lauzon moved up to take McNabb's place next to Shea Theodore on the Golden Knights' top pairing.

Detroit Red Wings captain Dylan Larkin has requested a trade, a development that carries significant implications for the franchise, a league source told The Athletic. Sportsnet's Elliotte Friedman first reported the news.

Larkin, who will turn 30 in late July, has spent his entire 11-season NHL career in Detroit, his hometown market. He has recorded 643 points in 808 games and has served as team captain since 2021. He is the only active Red Wing who appeared in the franchise's last playoff appearance in 2016.

The request arrives after Detroit missed the postseason for the tenth straight year, the longest active drought in the league.

Tension between Larkin and general manager Steve Yzerman became public a year ago following Larkin's pointed remarks about the club's inactivity at the 2025 trade deadline. Despite that friction, Larkin had spoken optimistically about his future in Detroit as recently as this past spring.

"I knew that we had work to do, and I knew that we weren't going to win the Stanley Cup the next day," said Larkin, "but I wanted to be here, and I want to be here, to help this team in any way I can to win a Stanley Cup."

The situation is further complicated by Larkin's full no-trade clause, which grants him significant control over any potential destination and narrows Detroit's options considerably. Larkin signed an eight-year contract extension in 2023.

The Vegas Golden Knights rallied from an early deficit to defeat the Carolina Hurricanes 5-4 on the road in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals, with Tomas Hertl scoring the decisive goal in what became a dramatic series opener.

Carolina held a 59 percent series-win probability on Polymarket entering the game, a figure that climbed to 69 percent after the Hurricanes took an early lead. Vegas then scored twice in the second period and twice more in the third to complete the comeback.

Hertl provided the winning margin with his third-period goal. Mitch Marner and Jack Eichel each added an assist, extending their league-leading playoff point totals to 22 and 19, respectively. Brett Howden, the NHL's top goal-scorer this postseason, pushed his tally to 11 with a third-period marker of his own.

The outcome produced a sharp reversal in Polymarket's Stanley Cup odds. Vegas entered Game 2 as 58.5 percent series favorites with a 17-percentage-point swing from where Carolina stood at the start of the game. That movement mirrors the NBA Finals, where the New York Knicks generated a comparable 16-point swing after winning Game 1 on the road. The pattern suggests prediction markets are pricing road wins in Finals play as highly decisive momentum shifts, regardless of regular-season credentials.

Carolina posted a 22-7-0 record following any type of loss during the regular season, good for a .759 points percentage, which was the highest mark in the NHL. The Hurricanes are historically difficult to beat twice in a row.

Meanwhile, Marner leads the Conn Smythe Trophy race on Polymarket at 40 percent, ahead of goaltender Fredrik Andersen at 21 percent.

Game 2 is scheduled for Thursday at 8:00 PM ET at Lenovo Center in Raleigh.

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Minnesota Wild forward Marcus Foligno has received this season's King Clancy Memorial Trophy for leadership and service, the NHL announced Thursday.

Foligno was recently presented the trophy in a surprise appearance at the Masonic Cancer Center at the University of Minnesota by his older brother and current teammate, Nick Foligno, who won the award in 2017. They established the Janis Foligno Foundation in memory of their mother, who died of breast cancer in 2009, and have been active in fundraising for breast cancer research.

The Carolina Hurricanes remain confident in goaltender Frederik Andersen despite his numbers declining dramatically over the past six games.

Andersen gave up five goals on 23 shots in Carolina's Game 1 loss to the Vegas Golden Knights in the Stanley Cup Final on Tuesday, a continuation of a statistical decline that began in the Eastern Conference finals. But coach Rod Brind'Amour said he doesn't have concerns with Andersen.

"I think a couple of those games, we weren't giving up a lot of shots. So the save percentage count is a tough one for our team," Brind'Amour said. "We don't give up a lot. There's still quality chances. There's just not a lot of fluff. So yeah, I'm not concerned about it."

Jon Cooper of the Tampa Bay Lightning has finally won the Jack Adams Award as NHL coach of the year.

Cooper, 58, completed his 14th NHL season as the Lightning's head coach. He led Tampa Bay to third in the Eastern Conference (106 points) during a season that saw them play through significant lineup absences from stars like defensemen Victor Hedman and Ryan McDonagh, as well as top center Brayden Point. The league's longest-tenured coach helped the Lightning to a ninth consecutive playoff berth, before they lost in the first round to the Montreal Canadiens.

The Dallas Stars announced Tuesday they have signed a letter of intent for a potential new arena in the suburb of Plano.

They are proposing building a new arena at The Shops of Willow Bend as part of a potential new mixed-use development that would make it a sports and entertainment district.

The Stars said in their statement they have signed a nonbinding LOI that was submitted to the City of Plano and will go before the Plano City Council next Monday.

The NHL All-Star Weekend will have an international hockey flavor after the success of the 4 Nations Face-Off and the Winter Olympics.

The 2027 midseason classic, scheduled for Feb. 5-6 at UBS Arena in Elmont, New York, will feature teams representing Canada, Finland, Sweden, the United States and a "World" team comprising international players from countries outside of those four.

Deputy commissioner Bill Daly confirmed that Russian players will be permitted on the World team, despite an uncertain status for other international hockey events.

Commissioner Gary Bettman said the NHL will enter an exclusive renegotiation window with U.S. media rights holders ESPN and TNT Sports beginning next year, doing so from a position of historic audience strength that has seen double-digit viewership growth in every round of the current playoffs.

Bettman made the comments ahead of Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final between the Carolina Hurricanes and Las Vegas Golden Knights, saying preliminary conversations with the two networks and their parent companies, Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery, have begun but formal negotiations have not yet commenced.

"I am excited about those prospects, based on how well we're performing," Bettman said. "While there have been some casual discussions, we're not at the point where we're in firm negotiations. We'll respect the rights that are in the contracts, and if things materialize sooner, great. If we're not, we're more than prepared to go through the usual routine."

The league's current seven-year deals with ESPN and WBD run through the 2027-28 season and are collectively worth approximately $4.5 billion over their full term. Bettman declined to specify financial targets for the next cycle, though the NHL's leverage appears substantial. The league signed a 12-year English-language Canadian rights deal with Rogers Communications last year worth $7.7 billion, providing a useful benchmark for what the U.S. market could yield.

One potential complication is the NFL's separate move to exercise opt-outs in its own domestic rights agreements and begin new talks as soon as this year. Those negotiations will also involve Disney and Paramount, the CBS Sports parent company currently in the process of acquiring WBD. As the most-watched programming in American television absorbs a larger share of the rights market, the NHL and other leagues may find themselves competing for the remaining available resources.

Tomas Hertl scored 16:36 into the third period, and the Vegas Golden Knights overcame an early deficit to defeat the Carolina Hurricanes 5-4 in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final on Tuesday night.

It was Hertl's fourth of the postseason, off assists from Colton Sissons and Shea Theodore, as Vegas rallied from a 2-0 first-period deficit to hand Carolina just its second loss of the postseason.

Theodore, Ivan Barbashev, William Karlsson and Brett Howden also scored for Vegas, which is attempting to win its second Stanley Cup since 2023.