SUMMERLIN, Nev. — The gigantic mural splashed on the wall inside the Golden Knights’ practice facility is proof that it was not a dream three months ago.
“Stanley Cup Champions 2023,” it read.
“It’s a good reminder every day to come into the building of what we’ve accomplished,” Jack Eichel, one of the players in the mural holding the Cup above his head, said Monday as he sat with the The Athletic.
“But it’s a great reminder of what it’s like to win that. Everyone’s shifting their focus now to the season ahead.”
Eichel was back on the ice Monday with several of his teammates as the players hit the ground running before camp officially opens next week.
It was a short summer. That’s the best kind if it means winning it all, but a short summer is even more important for a guy like Eichel after his long road back from neck surgery two years ago.
“It feels good,” Eichel said of his body ahead of the camp. “I think it’s important to rest. Obviously there’s a physical aspect to everything. But just mentally and emotionally, I think the run itself in the playoffs takes a lot out of you. So just be able to get away from it, relax, try to get your mind out of hockey and try to reset, I think I did that for a while.
“And yes, then you go back to training and trying to prepare and heal your body.”
Many Cup champions in the salary cap era have lost key components, making defending that title very difficult, with everyone doing what the Penguins did in 2016 and ’17 and the Lightning in 2020 and ’21 will be even more impressive.
And while the loss of an important leader in Reilly Smith, an original Golden Knight, is difficult, the Cup champions bring back most of their team. They now have the tools to defend their title.
“It’s a lot of the same faces,” Eichel said. “Losing Smithy is hard. There are other guys that are here that we don’t have anymore, like LB (Laurent Brossoit), but like you said most of the guys are coming back and we really like our group. It’s rare that you can continue a team. I remember talking to Smithy after he was traded and he explained that. It’s hard to put teams together. … But we’ve got a lot of the same guys coming back and some young, hungry guys that want to make an impact on the team.
“I like where we are.”
It’s time to turn the page on last season, but not before the players have had their Cup day this summer. For Eichel, the day was made in his hometown of North Chelmsford near Boston.
“An amazing day,” Eichel said. “I had the opportunity to receive the Cup in my hometown, at my parents’ house. … We took it to the youth hockey rink where I learned to play hockey and we had so many fans and supporters and people in the community come. It was very nice.
“Just being able to bring the Cup to some places in my hometown is something for me, and part of it is just being able to share it with other people and see their reaction when they’re around Stanley Cup.”
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Jack Eichel, Stanley Cup champion – How he rewrote his story in a grueling postseason
The experience ended with the Cup at his beach house with friends and family – “a lot of people helped me on my journey,” he said.
Imagine if someone had whispered in Eichel’s ear two years ago, during his lowest ebb while battling a neck injury and his exit saga from Buffalo, that he would raise a Cup in short order. .
From one extreme to another in a roller coaster of emotions in less than two years.
“It’s really hard to imagine doing this,” Eichel said. “As a child you let your mind wander and you dream about (winning the Cup). But it’s a difficult thing to do. And I appreciate our team and the organization and having the opportunity to be a part of it .
“We have a lot of special guys and players and people that are part of this organization that make that dream a reality. Of course I take that.”
“Remembering everything that happened, I will not say that I will change because I am here. This is the happiest I’ve been in a long time. I have the opportunity to be a part of this amazing organization and fulfill a lifelong dream of the past season. I got my health back and I’m enjoying playing hockey again and I’m excited to go to the rink and be with these guys.
Eichel is maturing here. A lot was pushed on him early after being taken second in the draft by Buffalo in 2015. The constant comparisons of his draft year to Connor McDavid, the captaincy at a young age with the Sabers, the big contract, the damage, and good, the loss. Lots of losses. That hurt Eichel. Maybe he doesn’t always handle things as well as he could.
Also, maturation. Live and learn.
And that maturity was front and center in June’s Cup Final when he diffused the situation after being crushed by Florida’s Matthew Tkachuk in Game 2, calling it a clean hit and not letting the emotion of the moment make it a bigger deal.
It’s awe-inspiring to see.
“You know what? Honestly, I’m telling the truth,” Eichel said. “I went back and looked at the hit again, it wasn’t a dirty hit. It was a big hit for sure. But if you look at it, he didn’t hit it. my head; he slammed his shoulder into my chest. What can I say about it? It’s a physical game. You’re going to get hurt. Obviously, I wish I hadn’t put myself in that position, but I didn’t find- the need to create something from nothing.
“The other part of it is that you don’t want to give the other team any bulletin board material. … I am an emotional person and there have been times when I may have said things through the media that I regret saying. But in that situation, it’s a clean review. Pick it up and keep moving. “
And that’s just it: Eichel is back in action after a brief exit from Game 2. Taking that hit and feeling no worse for wear because of his history, that’s the best part of all. . It looks like Eichel announced to the world that he is totally back.
“Everybody’s worried about the neck there,” Eichel smiled. “I got the wind knocked out of me. I think that was the perfect example of surgery that worked and went well. I know my surgeon was very happy. He was not happy that I was hit but happy to see that everything went well afterwards.
Eichel was quick to add that he gives a lot of credit to his chiropractor, Mark Lindsay, who has worked with him throughout the playoffs.
“He worked overtime,” Eichel said. “So much was done to help me.”
Eichel led all playoff scorers with 26 points (six goals) in 22 games. The best may be yet to come, however. This season could be very special where his game is back.
“Being away from the game for a while like I was, it takes time to get your feet back … to get your confidence back,” Eichel said. “I’m happy that our team went well in the playoffs and I found personal success. Hopefully I can build on that.”
Jack Eichel, Stanley Cup champion.
If that’s not the ultimate middle finger to his harshest critics on the road, I don’t know what is.
And there are a lot of haters, which is natural when you force a trade. There were also nay-sayers who doubted his decision to undergo surgery that no NHL player had ever done before.
So yes, lifting the Cup on June 13 was a vindication.
“If I sit here and tell you it’s not good to shut a lot of people down or prove them wrong, I’m lying,” Eichel said. “It’s a great opportunity for our team to do that. A lot of people wrote to us last year coming into the season not making the playoffs last year. And even going through the playoffs, it felt like everyone kind of takes sides with every team we play against.
“We heard it as a group and we understood that there was not a lot of respect for our team. And we used it as fire and motivation.”
A brief pause, before Eichel sums it up.
“After some things and all the criticism and people attacking me and my character, I think it’s a great feeling to try and change that narrative,” he said.
That, indeed, is Eichel.
(Top photo of Jack Eichel raising the Stanley Cup: Bruce Bennett/Getty Images)