Can rowdy T-Mobile Arena make Game 7 difference?

T-Mobile Arena: The NHL’s best atmosphere.

Nothing like the venue’s first Game 7 to prove it.

It has reached the summit, this divisional playoff round between the Golden Knights and Minnesota Wild, a best-of-seven series to be decided Friday night.

The winner heads to Colorado for a second-round opener Sunday; the loser slowly grits its way through a handshake line.

You play all season chasing significant goals, the obvious being to hoist the Stanley Cup. But along such a challenging pursuit is the idea that having home ice in the most critical of moments affords you a substantial edge.

Might want to score

It really doesn’t in hockey — certainly not to the extent of other sports — but it’s what you tell yourself after blowing a 3-1 series lead for the third time in three seasons.

And yet the former might actually hold true Friday. Really. It might be the one thing capable of propelling the Knights to play on. That, and actually scoring.

I mean, the part about having the luxury of a last change as the home team could prove large, but can it really eclipse the sublime and powerful influence the league’s best mascot in Chance might cast upon the setting?

I jest. I also misspelled Gritty.

“It doesn’t matter how you got here — you have one game to advance, and you have to make it your best game,” said Knights coach Pete DeBoer, who is 5-0 in Game 7s. “Whatever that looks like. Rely on the foundation you have built all year, and we’ve got a pretty good one.

“We’ve done a good job of pushing this to a one-game opportunity in our home rink, and we have to take advantage of that.”

It was really the Wild that pushed. The Knights just couldn’t stop it from happening.

There is no denying the passion and uproar that reverberates throughout T-Mobile Arena on game night. A fan base whose mastery of hockey’s entangled elements has expanded over time has a distinctive opportunity Friday. There again will be 12,000-plus in attendance. It will sound like twice that.

But it all flies in the face of what is expected during the NHL playoffs, which is to say things like sleeping in one’s own bed for an extra day hasn’t proven much of an advantage at all over time.

In fact, home teams have a winning percentage of 58.0 in 181 all-time Game 7 matchups in the Stanley Cup playoffs. Not an overwhelming edge.

But the team that scores first in those games has won 75 percent of the time. So, you know, don’t either side be afraid to actually rush forward this game.

The Knights were 21-5-2 at home in the regular season, and yet it’s true part of such a sparkling mark was the fact that the University of Massachusetts could have finished fifth in the West Division. Still, the Knights have also won nearly 70 percent of home games since entering the league.

Voted the best

In a 2019 poll of NHL players, T-Mobile Arena was voted to have the best atmosphere at an overwhelming 42.5 percent. The next closest was Bell Centre in Montreal at 21.2 percent.

Tell it to the Wild, who are 3-0 all time in Game 7s.

With all three wins coming on the road.

“The important part is to not get too bottled up with it,” Minnesota coach Dean Evason said. “It’s Game 7, and when the puck is dropped, we’ll play as hard as we possibly can and see where we sit at the end of the night. We’ve been a desperate hockey club and will continue to do that.”

T-Mobile Arena welcomes all of that and more Friday.

Let’s see what sort of difference — if any — it can make in the outcome.

Ed Graney is a Sigma Delta Chi Award winner for sports column writing and can be reached at egraney@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4618. He can be heard on “The Press Box,” ESPN Radio 100.9 FM and 1100 AM, from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. Monday through Friday. Follow @edgraney on Twitter.