Series Preview: 3 Biggest Challenges Golden Knights Face Against Avalanche

It’s been a self-proclaimed trying year for the Vegas Golden Knights , and they’d love nothing more than to cap it off with a trip to the Stanley Cup Finals. The only thing standing in their way… is the President’s Trophy-winning Colorado Avalanche . Make no mistake: the Avalanche are the best team in the league, and on paper they’re the better team in the series.

The Golden Knights have a steep hill to climb if they don’t want to get caught in the snowdrift. Here are the three biggest challenges they’ll face as they try to topple the big bad Avs. 1.

Center Depth The Golden Knights are a much stronger team with William Karlsson back in the lineup. However, there’s no denying that the Avalanche have some of, if not the, best center depth in the league. They made a buzzer-beater move for Nazem Kadri at the deadline, which took them from exceptional to elite.

Nathan MacKinnon, Brock Nelson, and Jack Drury round out the rest of the center corps— they’re so deep down the middle, Nic Roy is slotting in on the wing. The Avalanche centermen are all 200-foot players who are just as strong on the defensive side of the puck as they are offensively. Brock Nelson was a Selke finalist, and Nathan MacKinnon is no slouch defensively.