Stone overcomes injury, adversity to lead Golden Knights to Cup win

LAS VEGAS -- Mark Stone was mobbed.

He had just slung a shot down toward the open net and his celebration was exuberant, flailing his arm and screaming, embracing his teammates and the moment. The hats started flying immediately afterward, coating the ice in black and gold, sequins and Vegas Golden Knights logos.

It was 14:06 of the third period, and the Golden Knights led the Florida Panthers by a five-goal margin that would eventually expand to six in a 9-3 win in Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Final at T-Mobile Arena. Stone knew in that moment that he was winning the Stanley Cup, that the hard work was paying off, that the rehab and the back surgery and the hope had resulted in a moment that he couldn't even have ever dreamed up.

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Because who dreams this big?

To be the captain of the team, to have a hat trick in the Stanley Cup-clinching game, to have come back from the trials that Stone has endured?

That's the stuff of fairytales.

"Once we got that comfortable lead, your head starts spinning, right?" Stone said. "All you can think about is throwing your gloves, your helmet in the air and celebrating with your teammates. I just can't wait to keep celebrating."

And then he lifted the Cup.

"Words can't describe it," Stone said. "It's the best feeling in the world. You try and soak it all in, as much as you can. You savor this moment. You just can't believe it, right? It's finally come true. Your childhood goal, I guess you could say, was to be an NHL player. And once you get to the NHL, your goal is to win the Stanley Cup.

"Here we are, standing as Stanley Cup champions, and I couldn't be more excited for this group, this city and this organization as a whole."

But getting here was not easy.

There were back issues reaching all the way to the 2021 Stanley Cup Playoffs, and last season Stone was limited to 37 games in the regular season because of injury, returning at the end of the season in a vain attempt to get the Golden Knight into the playoffs.

Instead, he had a lumbar discectomy in May of 2022.

This season was supposed to be different, to be better, to be less painful. But no. The back was injured again Jan. 12 against the Panthers. It would be his final game of the 2022-23 regular season.

He needed surgery, again. His second back surgery in nine months was performed by Dr. Chad Prusmack, the doctor who had helped repair teammate Jack Eichel, on Jan. 31.

He would have to work and get himself back. He would have to make it happen.

"It's been a hard couple of years, health-wise," Stone said. "When the team started having that success in February, we started getting rolling, it just gives you all the energy to work as hard as you can, get back and be a part of this team."

In the middle of all that, his daughter Scarlett was born, in March. He held the 3-month-old as he celebrated on the ice Tuesday, with his wife and his parents and his brother, Michael, who played last season for the Calgary Flames.

Stone returned for Game 1 of the Western Conference First Round against the Winnipeg Jets on April 18, three months since he had last played.

"Unbelievable competitor. Big-game player. Great leader," coach Bruce Cassidy said. "I'm happy for him. He's been through two major, major surgeries. Didn't know if he'd come back and play. We had no idea. Good for him."

In 22 games in the playoffs, Stone had 24 points (11 goals, 13 assists), including those three in the Cup-clinching game.

"He's our leader," forward Jonathan Marchessault said. "He's our guy. He came in the second year. He's been great since the first moment he came in. He was unbelievable. He's been such a great factor in every step of the way, off the ice, and on the ice."

He opened the scoring in Game 5 with a short-handed goal at 11:52 of the first period, becoming the first player to score a short-handed goal in a clinching game since 2011, when Patrice Bergeron did so in Game 7.

But Stone was far from done.

He scored the team's fifth goal of the game at 17:15 of the second period, adding to a lead that seemed to be growing by the second. And then it was time for the piece de resistance, completing the hat trick with an empty-net goal at 14:06 of the third.

Stone is the fourth player in NHL history with a hat trick for a team playing in a potential Cup-clinching game, joining Babe Dye in Game 5 in 1922 and Ted Kennedy in Game 4 in 1945, both for the Toronto Maple Leafs, and Jack Darragh in Game 5 in 1920 for the original Ottawa Senators. Dye, Darragh and Stone are the only ones to do so in a game in which their team did indeed clinch.

It was something that Stone couldn't have wished for, couldn't have even thought up as he went through the rehab and the off-ice work, as he willed himself back onto the ice, back for the playoffs, only to lead this team to the Cup.

"For him to grind out last year, the same thing, this year, the same thing, he wanted to come back," Marchessault said. "Honestly, for him to get a hat trick tonight, you couldn't write it better than that. Such a great comeback story."