The Stanley Cup received its annual update on Wednesday, as the names of the Carolina Hurricanes’ championship team, including players, coaches, executives, and staff, were engraved on hockey’s holy grail.
And, if you look closely, every member of the Hurricanes owner’s family.
In fact, the first two lines, before any player who took the ice or coach that helped the team win, were dedicated just to the Dundons.
- Tom Dundon (Hurricanes owner)
- Veruschka Dundon (wife)
- Caden Dundon (child)
- Dax Dundon (child)
- Drew Dundon (child)
- Blake Dundon (child)
- Tagan Dundon (child)
Please note: Veruschka, Caden, Dax, Drew, Blake, and Tagan all do not have a role with the team.
Dundon’s move to hijack the first 90 characters on the engraving comes after he originally purchased the Hurricanes in 2018 for $420 million, giving him majority control of the franchise. He later bought out all minority shares to become the sole owner in 2021. By early 2026, the franchise’s value had grown significantly, allowing Dundon to sell a 12.5 percent stake in the team at a valuation of $2.66 billion, with three new investors becoming minority owners in March.
With only 55 names allowed per each Stanley Cup-winning team, and the Canes opting to include just 53, the Dundon family took up six spots that would typically be given to other members of the team’s staff (the owner is always included). Per the NHL’s engraving eligibility rules, the team controls whose names to submit, aside from players, who are traditionally members of the management staff, such as equipment managers and trainers.
Other candidates that were ultimately snubbed from the engraving included Joel Nystrom (player), Jesper Fast (development coach), and Kristen Pirigyi (team nutritionist).
Nystrom played 38 games with Carolina during the regular season, just three games short of the 41 required to be automatically eligible. Teams can petition to add players who do not meet the requirements, like Nicolas Deslauriers who only played 7 regular-season games and 1 playoff game with the Canes, and whose name appears on the Cup. Charles Legault, who played 12 games, was also left off the list.
Fast, whose name was also missing, played four seasons in Carolina before becoming a development coach for the team this season. Kristen Pirigyi is the team’s nutritionist and has been with the organization for eight seasons. She is the only member of the medical staff missing, with both athletic trainers, the strength and conditioning coach, the massage therapist, and the coordinator of rehabilitation and sports science/physical therapist all included.
The team’s three minority owners were also omitted.
The Keeper of the Cup, Phil Pritchard, told Jeff Marek that he and the Hall did not see the names beforehand, and that he discovered which names were included once the Cup was fully engraved.
Per NHL rules, the list of names to be engraved on the Stanley Cup must be approved by the Hockey Hall of Fame and the NHL. According to freelance writer Ken Campbell, hockey operations department head Colin Campbell explicitly signed off on every name — as is required — on the NHL side.
Whether approved or not, the inclusion of the entire Dundon family has sent fans and the media alike into a frenzy, sparking an uproar on social media over a move many considered greedy and selfish. Defector’s Barry Petcheshky pointed out the sheer number of Dundons listed, joking that there were “more Dundons on the Cup than in an episode of Law and Order.” James Dater simply called it “gross.” Some fans edited the photo to cross out the Dundon names or altered the image to make every last name Dundon. Many wondered how the move was allowed. One fan even presented a mock-up for the championship rings based on Dundon’s apparent monopoly on the victory.
Much better pic.twitter.com/vae362gPkh
— Fire (@Fireprofcargo7) July 9, 2026
— Jan from Summerlin (@VicVega27400589) July 9, 2026
The inclusion of the owner’s family, and even the controversy surrounding who was included and who was left off, is not a new phenomenon. Recently, the back-to-back champion Florida Panthers saw Vincent Viola include his wife and children for both Cup wins, and Tampa Bay Lightning owner Jeffery Vinik had his then-wife included in 2021. But the Violas included did hold roles in the organization, regardless of whether their relation to the owner affected their job standing.
The biggest scandal with a non-player or staff name came from the Edmonton Oilers squad in 1984. Owner Peter Pocklington’s father, Basil, was initially included on the Cup, but was later crossed out due to his lack of involvement with the team. The incident led to some of the current standards of verifying names before engraving.
When the Washington Capitals claimed their first Stanley Cup in 2018, Nathan Walker, the league’s first Australian player who appeared in 7 regular season and 1 playoff game, did not get his name engraved.
In the one playoff game Walker appeared in, he had the primary assist on an Alex Chiasson even-strength goal in Game 6 of the Capitals’ second-round series against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
The Capitals would go on to eliminate the Penguins later that night and advance to the Eastern Conference Final for the first time in the Alex Ovechkin Era, after Evgeny Kuznetsov scored the series-winning goal in overtime.
