The Vegas Golden Knights made their surprising run to the 2026 Stanley Cup Finals behind goalie Carter Hart, but one reporter didn’t expect the Vegas fanbase to rally around him just months after the NHL reinstated him.
Before the 2025-26 season, Hart, 27, had not played for more than a year-and-a-half as the legal process played out surrounding a sexual assault allegation.
Mark Anderson, who covers Las Vegas sports for the Associated Press, told CBC News in a story published Thursday, July 4, that he is “a little bit” surprised that Golden Knights fans have embraced him in light of the controversy.
“Hart’s a key reason the Golden Knights are in the Stanley Cup final,” Anderson said, adding that Hart got a “warm ovation” when he was first introduced back in December 2025.
“Those are roars now … because he’s playing so well,” Anderson explained.
Hart and four of his teammates on the Team Canada world junior hockey team were charged with sexual assault in February 2024 after an alleged incident in an Ontario hotel room in 2018.
The woman who accused them admitted to having consensual sex with one of the players, but alleged he then invited his four teammates to the room to also have sex with her without her knowledge or consent. All five players maintained their innocence with Hart taking the stand at trial to insist that he engaged in consensual sex with his accuser.
The players were all found not guilty in July 2025 after a months-long trial with Justice Maria Carroccia saying the evidence presented was not “credible or reliable.”
“Having found that I cannot rely upon the evidence of [the accuser] and then considering the evidence in this trial as a whole, I conclude that the Crown cannot meet its onus on any of the counts before me,” she said.
Prosecuting lawyer Karen Bellehumeur said she was “very disappointed” by the decision.
“She’s really never experienced not being believed like this before,” she said about her client.
Hart later signed a two-year contract with the Golden Knights in October 2025. He reflected on his experience at the time, saying he was ready “to show the community my true character and who I am and what I’m about.”
“It’s been a long road to get back to this point, getting back to playing the game of hockey, the game that I love,” he said. “I’ve been out of the game for a year and a half now. I’ve learned a lot. I’ve grown a lot. Just excited to move forward.”
Vegas general manager Kelly McCrimmon recently said that the team went through a “lengthy process of due diligence” before signing Carter.
“Carter is a really good person,” he told reporters on Monday, June 1. “He’s ingrained himself in our community. He’s a player that I’ve known a long time, long prior to him becoming an NHL player. Playing very well. Obviously a big part of how our team is at this point that we’re at today, and he’s fit in seamlessly with his teammates.”
