LAS VEGAS — When the Vegas Golden Knights won the NHL’s Stanley Cup, a lot of credit was given to former Bowling Green State University player George McPhee.

Not because he was a player — those days are long over for McPhee. Because McPhee is director of hockey operations for the Knights and hired coach Bruce Cassidy.

Less than a full calendar year since putting pen to paper with Vegas, Cassidy and the Golden Knights won the Stanley Cup after beating the Florida Panthers in five games. It’s the first championship for the franchise and the veteran head coach.

“The rewarding part is seeing it all come together at the right time,” Cassidy said. “Every coach in this league works hard to prepare their team, puts in a lot of time and effort, sacrifice away from your family at times, so, that’s the rewarding part. And then to get your name on the Cup is the ultimate reward.”

McPhee said winning a Stanley Cup is not just about hockey.

“Yes, it’s great to have your name on a Stanley Cup,” McPhee said. “Yes, it’s great to get a Stanley Cup ring, but the experience with this group of players, that experience is amazing and rewarding, but the uplift that you give to a city is really what matters.”

McPhee burst on the scene as a Falcon in 1978-79, leading the team and the Central Collegiate Hockey Association in scoring with 88 points as a freshman, and earning the honor of CCHA Rookie of the Year.

A two-time team captain, McPhee became BGSU’s career scoring leader with 114 goals and 153 assists for 267 points, a mark that was topped one year later.

McPhee earned All-American and All-CCHA honors as a senior, before being named the 1982 Hobey Baker Award winner, college hockey’s equivalent of the college football’s Heisman Trophy. He was the CCHA’s first and only Hobey Baker Award winner.

McPhee played a stint in the NHL. A member of the New Jersey Devils, McPhee also had a brief stay with the Winnipeg Jets after spending five seasons with the New York Rangers. McPhee was inducted to the BGSU Athletic Hall of Fame in 1987.

Hiring Cassidy

McPhee had faith in Cassidy, despite having already fired him once.

Almost two decades ago, when Cassidy was dumped less than a season and a half into his tenure with the Washington Capitals, it seemed unheard of that he’d get another NHL job, let alone be on the doorstep of guiding a team to a championship.

McPhee — now Vegas’ president of hockey operations — hired Cassidy in 2002, then fired him 17 losses in 25 games into the 2003-04 season.

“Most guys go through what he went through and you’d never hear from them again,” former Capitals goaltender Olie Kolzig said in 2019.

Instead, Cassidy paid his dues in the minor leagues and got back in the NHL on Claude Julien’s staff in Boston by 2016.

“Give the guy credit: He came back from the dead,” said retired defenseman Colby Cohen, who played under Cassidy in Providence. “He grinded his way through, and he developed players. It really is impressive.”

Cassidy was a midseason replacement in 2017 and coached the Bruins to the playoffs six seasons in a row before a first-round exit last year prompted Boston to let him go. When the Golden Knights wanted a coach with winning experience, they hired Cassidy.

“If you have a team, a veteran team that is ready for winning, I’m not sure there’s a better coach right now in hockey than him,” Cohen said. “He is good at what he does.

“His ability to adjust in game, and his ability to see what’s happening within a game and change on the fly or or pull a different lever — changing lines, getting a certain matchup changing the forecheck, changing neutral zone sets — if you do it, you are successful as a team.”

The Golden Knights won 13 of their first 15 games with Cassidy and finished atop the Western Conference despite goaltending injuries and other adversity that might have knocked them off course — like it did last season, prompting Peter DeBoer’s firing as coach.

“He thinks the game really well,” Vegas leading scorer Jonathan Marchessault said about Cassidy. “He kept us humble and kept us also the mindset of just one game at a time and don’t think too far and stay in the moment. I think that’s been one of the big things for us this year.”

Vegas cruised through the first two rounds of the playoffs, beating Winnipeg in five games and getting past Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and Edmonton to reach the West final. That is perhaps where his best coaching of the year came the night before Game 6 against Dallas.

The Golden Knights, once up 3-0, had lost two in a row and were on the brink of falling apart.

Cassidy gathered players for a meeting to crystallize for them what was at stake.

“It was kind of like, ‘All right, that’s enough, let’s close this out,’” center Chandler Stephenson recalled. “So, we had our best game of the playoffs.”

Until Game 5, when the Golden Knights dominated the Panthers to win the Stanley Cup and make Cassidy a champion.

“It’s very rewarding,” Cassidy said. “I’m in the club now.”

( — by Sentinel-Tribune Sports Editor J. Patrick Eaken and includes Associated Press reports)