The Vegas Golden Knights now find themselves in a best-of-three series for the Stanley Cup after the Carolina Hurricanes evened the series 2-2 with a 5-3 win in Game 4. The Knights trailed by two goals two different times in the first two periods, but came back to tie the game at three before the Hurricanes pulled away in the third period.
Despite the loss, John Tortorella was still pleased with how the Knights played in the third period. He talked about his biggest regret from the loss after the game, via Vince Sapienza of Fox 5 Vegas.
John Tortorella on what was the difference in Game 4:
"It's just for free. That's a hard one for me in the third period." #ForgedInGold @FOX5Vegas @silverstsports pic.twitter.com/XhpirpRWwA
— Vince Sapienza (@VinceSapienza) June 10, 2026
“I thought we battled back and I thought the third period was probably our best period,” Tortorella said. “The frustrating part for me is, they don’t earn their winning goal. It’s not so much the turnover, Carter makes a great save, but after that we make another mistake and leave the front of the net. There are a lot of good minutes in the game. It’s just for free. That’s a hard one for me in the third period. So we’ll regroup and get ready for the next one.”
The game-winning goal, scored by Jordan Staal, was a greasy one in front of the net with the Canes captain diving across the ice while he flipped the puck in the back of the net. However, Tortorella is onto something, as Vegas was still able to get back into the game after falling into an early 2-0 hole and nearly tied it again late before Nikolaj Ehlers scored an empty-net goal to seal the deal.
The complication from the Game 4 loss is that Vegas no longer has home-ice advantage in the series, and will now have to win another game in Raleigh to win the Stanley Cup. However, Tortorella and company are still clearly confident that Vegas can come out on top in this series.
After four games that have gone right down to the wire, the Golden Knights still have plenty of chances in front of them to get back on top in this series.
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