Update: here's what I did - after a test ride last night it seemed to work
[1] Cut wires going to faulty thermistor that is buried inside motor. Added heat shrink to the end of the cut wires to seal them off.
[2] Used the original connector to add a replacement thermistor + I added a potentiometer in series so I could offset the temperature by about 8 degrees C. Soldered and used heat shrink to seal everything up though I left a bit of the thermistor exposed so it can read the temp more accurately.
[3] Put the new thermistor in the opening where the original wires passed through. Not as embedded as the original thermistor, so the actual motor temp is likely 10C higher than what the new thermistor is reading (thus I added the potentiometer to offset the temp by about 8 degrees).
Here's a very brief video:
See attached pic