Stanley Cup Final blog: Jordan Martinook

Carolina Hurricanes forward Jordan Martinook will be keeping his own blog throughout the 2026 Stanley Cup Final against the Vegas Golden Knights. He will check in regularly with behind-the-scenes access.

In his fifth entry, Martinook discusses a got-to-have-it 5-3 win against the Golden Knights in Game 4 of the Stanley Cup Final at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas on Tuesday, tying the best-of-7 series at two games apiece. The Hurricanes, who started backup Brandon Bussi in net and scratched starter Frederik Andersen, jumped to a 3-1 lead in the first period only to surrender two goals in the second. Carolina has been outscored 9-1 in the four second periods of this series. Captain Jordan Staal scored his second goal of the game at 6:32 of the third while falling to the ice and reaching back to bat the puck into the goal to give the Hurricanes the lead before Nikolaj Ehlers scored into an empty net with 55 seconds remaining.

The teams play Game 5 at Lenovo Center on Thursday (8 p.m. ET; ABC, SN, TVAS, CBC).

It was a great start. I felt we were all going really good. I feel like our second period wasn’t that bad, it’s just that they keep scoring. Going 3-3 in the third period, I felt like they pushed pretty hard in the first few minutes and then we had a few good shifts that we strung together where we were in their zone. 

Obviously ‘Jordo,’ Seth Jarvis and Nikolaj Ehlers, their shift kind of turned it for us and obviously Jordo, that’s an incredible individual effort to get that puck in. That’s an incredibly hard goal to score.

Seeing what he has been able to do in this Final is unbelievable. As a teammate, you are pumped up for him, but he is one of my best friends. To see what he is doing is really special. He’s put this team on his back. That’s what a captain does and that is what he has been doing. 

That goal is unbelievable hand-eye coordination, and he is 6-foot-5 and 235 pounds and to be able to turn and contort himself and get a good whack on it, that’s impressive stuff.

After that, we locked it down pretty good.

I thought that chance by Jack Eichel off the draw was a good one but other than that we didn’t give them a ton when it was 6-on-5. 

Bussi was incredible. I think, for him, coming in last game, that was a great, great thing for him. It kind of took a little bit of the nerves out of him a little bit.  I don’t think we need to beat around the bush. At the start of the year do you think he was thinking he was going to start in the Stanley Cup Final, probably not.

He had an incredible year for us, and it was almost unfortunate that he didn’t get a chance to play in the playoffs, but Freddie was playing phenomenal. Freddie goes down and we know we have an incredible goalie right behind him. I thought he was exactly what we needed tonight, made big saves at big moments. That’s what you want.

Obviously, we knew how important this game was. Three-one is a lot different than 2-2. Now it turns into a best-of-3 with two home games in Raleigh. That’s something we like. We like playing in Raleigh. We like playing in front of our fans. We know it is a hard place to play.

We will get home, see our families and get ready to play. It’s a quick turnaround to play on Thursday, but it was a quick turnaround between Game 2 and Game 3. 

We train all year for moments like this. We’re going to have a lot of energy. It’s the biggest series of your life; you aren’t going to be tired at all.

It’s survival of the fittest this time of year and we hope we are the fittest.