3 Keys: Canucks vs. Golden Knights, Game 7 of Western Second Round

No. 5 Canucks vs. No. 1 Golden Knights
9 p.m. ET; NBCSN, CBC, SN, TVAS
Best-of-7 series tied, 3-3

The Vancouver Canucks and Vegas Golden Knights will play Game 7 of the Western Conference Second Round at Rogers Place on Friday.
The winner will advance to the Western Conference Final to play the Dallas Stars, who defeated the Colorado Avalanche 5-4 in overtime to win Game 7 of their second-round series in Edmonton, the hub city in the West, on Friday.
The Canucks won Game 6 on Thursday 4-0 to even the series after avoiding elimination with a 2-1 win in Game 5 on Tuesday, with rookie goalie Thatcher Demko making his first two Stanley Cup Playoff starts.
Vancouver is trying to win a best-of-7 series after trailing 3-1 for the fourth time in its history, most recently against the St. Louis Blues in the 2003 Western Conference First Round. The Canucks are also eyeing their first appearance in the conference final since 2011.
Robin Lehner is the starting goalie for Vegas. He made 19 saves in the Game 6 loss.
Teams that lose Games 5 and 6 after leading a series 3-1 are 28-29 (49.1 percent) winning a best-of-7 Stanley Cup Playoff series.
Here are 3 Keys to Game 7:

1. Demko's place in spotlight

Demko said he would be excited to get an opportunity to play in Game 7 despite the fact it would come less than 24 hours after needing to exert the finest performance of his NHL career.
Canucks coach Travis Green did not reveal his starting goalie after Game 6. Goalie Jacob Markstrom was unfit to play for the second straight game on Thursday. As part of the NHL Return to Play Plan, a team is not permitted to disclose player injury or illness information.
Demko made 42 saves in his first NHL postseason start in Game 5 on Tuesday and 48 in Game 6. He has made 66 consecutive saves since allowing a goal to Shea Theodore at 15:12 of the second period in Game 5 and has a 0.47 goals-against average and .990 save percentage in three playoff games.
Golden Knights forward Alex Tuch, who was Demko's teammate with the United States for the 2015 World Junior Championship and for two seasons at Boston College, said Vegas needs to find a way to get to him.
"Thatcher's always been a special goalie. He's always been very talented, good work ethic," Tuch said. "I played with him for several years, know him really well but he's on the other side so I'm going to try to do everything in my power to get as many pucks past him as need be. He's been playing really well but we're going to come out and try to break him tonight."

2. Vegas goalie question

Lehner, who started 11 of Vegas' 14 games this postseason, including five of six in this series, was the choice over Marc-Andre Fleury.
Lehner lost his last two starts, with a 2.56 GAA and .872 save percentage. Fleury last started in Game 4 on Sunday, making 28 saves in a 5-3 win, the second of a back-to-back.
"Whoever plays, plays," Lehner said. "If I get to play, I'll do my best like I always do. … If you play, just got to do your best."
Lehner is 7-4-0 with a 2.17 GAA, .914 save percentage and two shutouts in 11 postseason games. Fleury is 3-0-0 with a 2.67 GAA and .893 save percentage in three games.

3. Power-less play

The Golden Knights and Canucks are each 0-for-7 on the power play in the past two games, so finding success in this area could loom large in an elimination game.
"[Power play is] usually a symptom of our 5-on-5 game, and I think the same issues have crept into or bleed into our power play," DeBoer said. "It's traffic and making it tougher on [Demko] to see the puck and getting more pucks into that area with more bodies in that area."

Canucks projected lineup

J.T. Miller -- Elias Pettersson -- Brock Boeser
Tanner Pearson -- Bo Horvat -- Tyler Toffoli
Antoine Roussel -- Adam Gaudette -- Brandon Sutter
Tyler Motte -- Jay Beagle -- Jake Virtanen
Alexander Edler -- Troy Stecher
Quinn Hughes -- Chris Tanev
Oscar Fantenberg -- Tyler Myers
Thatcher Demko
Louis Domingue
Scratched: Olli Juolevi, Justin Bailey, Jalen Chatfield, Tyler Graovac, Brogan Rafferty, Loui Eriksson, Jordie Benn
Unfit to play: Micheal Ferland, Josh Leivo , Jacob Markstrom

Golden Knights projected lineup

Max Pacioretty -- William Karlsson -- Mark Stone
Jonathan Marchessault -- Paul Stastny -- Reilly Smith
Nick Cousins -- Nicolas Roy -- Alex Tuch
William Carrier -- Chandler Stephenson -- Ryan Reaves
Alec Martinez -- Shea Theodore
Brayden McNabb -- Nate Schmidt
Nick Holden -- Zach Whitecloud
Robin Lehner
Marc-Andre Fleury
Scratched:Dylan Coghlan, Oscar Dansk, Reid Duke, Deryk Engelland, Nicolas Hague, Keegan Kolesar, Peyton Krebs, Jon Merrill, Gage Quinney, Patrick Brown
Unfit to play:Tomas Nosek