Golden Knights look to shut down Stars with big, physical defensemen

LAS VEGAS --Alex Pietrangelo notices similarities between the Vegas Golden Knights' defense group and the one he was a part of with the St. Louis Blues in 2019. Alec Martinez needed a reminder first, but once his brain went there, he too recognized the same about the Golden Knights' defensemen and the Los Angeles Kings group he played with in the early-to-mid 2010s.

Size. Big, physical defensemen. Every single one of them. Mobile too.

The Blues won the Stanley Cup in 2019 with four defensemen who were bigger than the 6-foot-3 Pietrangelo. The Kings won the Stanley Cup in 2012 and again in 2014 with big, snarly defensemen like Willie Mitchell and Matt Greene. Rob Scuderi was on the 2012 team and Jake Muzzin the 2014 team.

The Golden Knights are eight wins away from their first Stanley Cup championship with Martinez as the smallest player in their top six defense group, and he's 6-foot-1, 210 pounds.

They play Game 1 of the Western Conference Final against the Dallas Stars at T-Mobile Arena on Friday (8:30 p.m. ET; ESPN, ESPN+, CBC, SN, TVAS).

Size on the back end will matter.

"Similar, yeah, but the only difference is we have six guys that can really skate and move the puck," Pietrangelo said. "We were big in 2019, but I think our group here might skate better collectively as a whole. That's also where the game is going. We have a real advantage when we play everybody."

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Everybody includes Pietrangelo (6-3, 215 pounds) and Martinez on the top pair, Brayden McNabb (6-4, 215) and Shea Theodore (6-2, 197) making up the second pair, and Zach Whitecloud (6-2, 207) and Nicolas Hague (6-6, 230) as the emerging third pair.

Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said it's the biggest group of six defensemen he has ever coached, and this is a guy who coached Zdeno Chara (6-9), Brandon Carlo (6-6) and Charlie McAvoy (6-1) with the Boston Bruins against Pietrangelo and the Blues in the 2019 Stanley Cup Final.

"We also had Torey Krug and [Matt] Grzelcyk who were smaller guys that balanced some of that size," Cassidy said. "Here we don't have those. It is a bigger group if you take the six of them. We try to use that to our advantage."

The Golden Knights believe that size is going to be of the utmost importance against the Stars, whose offense is predicated on getting the puck low to high and to the net, where they look for tips and deflections both at the top lip of the blue paint and as high as between the circles.

Dallas forward Joe Pavelski might be the best to ever play a net-front role in the NHL with his ability to seemingly always have his stick free for redirections. He scored eight goals in seven games against the Seattle Kraken in the Western Conference Second Round.

"Pavelski gets his stick on everything," McNabb said. "That's going to be a point of emphasis. You know they're going to be putting pucks there and we're going to have to win those loose puck battles. Our goalie is going to have to make some saves, but we're either going to have to get in the way or get under sticks and make sure to clear out the front of the net."

Vegas' system requires the defensemen to stay closer to the net, protecting that area, rather than straying to the wings or too high. But even Cassidy said they may have to get comfortable with being uncomfortable in the conference final.

"We all know Pavelski is probably second to none at that in the high slot, so the timing of our [defensemen] being net front to box out and clear rebounds for our goaltender, versus getting out to where Pavelski likes to tip pucks higher is something that they're going to be mindful of," Cassidy said. "You can be two feet away from him, he's still going to tip the puck. We've seen it over and over. That will be the challenge for us."

Cassidy said part of the responsibility falls on the Golden Knights wings to challenge the point and get into the shot lanes to prevent the Stars from trying to get the puck to the net. He said that will help the defensemen in making their reads for when to stay closer to the net and when to move up.

"It's the awareness of their ability to do that, being conscious of that and making sure you're up on those guys," Martinez said. "You don't want to be sagging back and let them step up into those and get the tips on them. While size helps, it's more of a mindset of taking that away and being aware of it."

But the size of the Golden Knights defensemen should help because of how effective and physical they are all around the net.

They can box out well. They get under sticks. They front pucks. And they all can skate.

"I think if you look at the past, just with how playoff teams are built, a lot of teams have bigger back ends too," Whitecloud said. "We've always been built that way. We take a lot of pride in defending the front of our net and making sure it's not an easy thought to go there. That's what you have to have in the playoffs.

"The Stars do a good job of getting guys to the net, so we have to manage that. They've got guys that can tip pucks, find lanes and find the secondary seams going to the net, so you've got to manage those and make sure you're getting on top of guys."