Hart 'zeroed in' as No. 1 goalie for Golden Knights in playoffs

DENVER -- Carter Hart is back in the Stanley Cup Playoffs and on top of his game.

The 27-year-old goalie made 36 saves for the Vegas Golden Knights in a 4-2 win against the Colorado Avalanche in Game 1 of the Western Conference Final at Ball Arena on Wednesday.

“He was unbelievable the whole game,” Golden Knights forward Pavel Dorofeyev said. “He’s, I would say, the biggest reason why we got a ‘W’ tonight. Happy for him, and he’s great.”

Hart is 9-4 with a 2.35 goals-against average and .920 save percentage in 13 starts entering Game 2 here Friday (8 p.m. ET; ESPN, SN, TVAS, CBC).

His numbers look remarkably similar to his only previous playoff run in the NHL, when he went 9-5 with a 2.23 GAA, .926 save percentage and two shutouts in 14 starts for the Philadelphia Flyers in 2020.

“Carter Hart’s a hell of a goalie,” Vegas coach John Tortorella said. “… I think he’s grown so strong mentally. I don’t think much bothers him. He is just zeroed in, and he’s going to have to be, because we’ve got a little bit of work to do here.”

The Flyers selected Hart in the second round (No. 48) of the 2016 NHL Draft. He played six seasons with them from 2018-24, going 96-93-29 with a 2.94 GAA, .906 save percentage and six shutouts in 227 games (218 starts).

Hart took a leave of absence from Philadelphia in the second half of the 2023-24 season and was unsigned in 2024-25. He was one of five players on Canada’s 2018 IIHF World Junior Championship gold-medal team accused of committing sexual assault in June of that year. All five were found not guilty.

The NHL determined the players would be eligible to sign NHL contracts Oct. 15, 2025, and play in NHL games Dec. 1, 2025. The Golden Knights signed Hart to a two-year, $4 million contract Oct. 24, 2025.

“I know I’ve been away from the game for a little while, but I feel like I’ve done everything I can to stay ready and to stay prepared and take care of my body, work on my game, in the gym, to just do all the little things,” Hart said at the time. “… It's different in a practice or a goalie skate versus in a game setting, facing game bullets, but that'll come, and we have time here to prepare and get ready for Dec. 1.”

Hart played three games for Henderson of the American Hockey League from Nov. 16-28, then debuted with the Golden Knights on Dec. 2, making 27 saves in a 4-3 shootout win against the Chicago Blackhawks.

He went 5-3-3 with a 3.28 goals-against average and an .871 save percentage in his first 12 games (12 starts), then sat out with a lower-body injury. When he returned, he had a new coach -- Tortorella, his old coach from his last two seasons with the Flyers, who replaced Bruce Cassidy on March 29.

Taking over a new team in a pressure situation, Tortorella felt comfortable with Hart because of their background together. In turn, Hart has been a big reason Vegas has gone 16-4-1 under Tortorella.

“He’s done a great job coming in here,” Hart said. “It’s never easy, with coming in how late in the season he did. I think he’s done a tremendous job of just rallying the group and earning the guys’ trust. I really enjoy playing for him. I enjoyed playing for him in Philly, and I’m happy he’s here.”

Hart went 6-0-0 with a 1.66 GAA and .930 save percentage in six starts from April 2-15 to finish the regular season.

He helped the Golden Knights defeat the Utah Mammoth in six games in the Western Conference First Round and the Anaheim Ducks in six games in the second round, and now he has helped stake them to a 1-0 lead against the Avalanche in the conference final.

At a time when NHL teams increasingly are using tandems in the playoffs, Hart has been on the only goalie Vegas has used this postseason, even though it has Adin Hill available.

Hill went 11-4 with a 2.17 GAA, .932 save percentage and two shutouts in 16 games (14 starts) when the Golden Knights won the Stanley Cup in 2023. He was 10-9-6 with a 3.04 GAA, .870 save percentage and one shutout in 27 starts this season.

“’Hilly,’ he’s a Stanley Cup winner, right?” Tortorella said. “We have trust in him. We haven’t gone there. We felt Carter has played that well, so we’ve stayed with him. It’s not like you’re trying to fix something that isn’t broke.”

Hart will need to keep it up against Colorado, which led the NHL in goals per game during the regular season (3.63) and leads the postseason in that category (3.90) too.

Avalanche captain Nathan MacKinnon led the NHL with 53 goals in the regular season and had seven goals on a six-game playoff scoring streak before Hart stopped all three shots he fired Wednesday.

But Hart isn’t looking ahead of the next shot.

“Just looking at things as one puck at a time,” he said, “and just trying to give my team a chance.”