How did Bruce Cassidy change the Vegas Golden Knights after taking over? Analyzing his best moves as he nears 1-year anniversary

Bruce Cassidy wasn't out of work for long as after he was let go by the Boston Bruins, he was hired eight days later by the Vegas Golden Knights.

Vegas hired him on June 14, 2022. Exactly one year later it's Game 5 of the Stanley Cup Finals, where the Golden Knights have a chance to hoist their first Stanley Cup in franchise history.

Although Vegas has been a solid team since coming into the league, Cassidy has coached them to the Cup Final and made some minor tweaks.

After Bruce Cassidy was fired by the Boston Bruins, he said atop his wishlist was a team that could win, which he thought the Vegas Golden Knights could do. Although they missed the playoffs last season, Cassidy felt the core group was one of the best in the NHL.

"I was going into a situation with a team that they want to win, that much I knew, and they had," Cassidy said. "They hadn't won the Cup, but they were as close as anybody other than probably [the Tampa Bay Lightning, who won the Cup in 2020 and 2021] in terms of how often they were knocking at the door.

"So, I knew that was there and there was a dressing room full of good players. …So, for me, that's what I knew I was getting into. Then, it's up to the coach to build a certain style of play, culture, identity of a team."

From the beginning of the season, Bruce Cassidy said he wasn't going to make any major changes to how Vegas played last season. Instead, he felt the biggest change he could do was off-ice and make the players closer.

Cassidy had seen the closer the teams are, the better they usually play as they all want to win and play well for each other.

Bruce Cassidy called out Jack Eichel in a huge turning point for the Golden Knights

Maybe the biggest turning point for Vegas this season was in January when Bruce Cassidy called out Jack Eichel for his play. The Golden Knights had lost four of five and not many coaches take aim at their best player in the public, but Cassidy did as he felt he needed to light a fire under his team.

"Jack just hasn't been the same driving force for us as he was at the start of the year on both ends of the ice," Cassidy said. "The expectations are not being met from Jack. He needs to be better for us especially as we're down a few guys that create offense for us. He needs to be one of the drivers.

"(I) think we've had passengers lately, guys that we rely on that need to be better," Cassidy said. "Timely save tonight could've made a difference. So I wouldn't put (Thursday's loss) on one element, but getting outworked in key situations, key times in the game, putting ourselves in bad spots was probably the start of it.

"As I said, we need better from some of our players that we rely on. And just to sort of expand on that, we went through injuries a little while ago. We came through it OK. Our effort was good. We had no passengers."

Along with calling out his best players and making them feel like a tight-knight group, arguably the best thing Bruce Cassidy has done is just let his team play.

Cassidy has rolled out his lines as he had faith and trust in everyone to make the right play, which goes a long way in teams winning.