Vegas Golden Knights Extend Home Winning Streak To Seven Games

The Vegas Golden Knights were ready to go from the drop of the puck against the Los Angeles Kings.

When the Los Angeles Kings came into town to play the Vegas Golden Knights, they came off a great game shutting out the Florida Panthers 4-0 on Saturday afternoon. Goaltender Jonathan Quick was ready to go after getting the night off. It all seemed to be going in the right direction for LA but once the team arrived at T-Mobile Arena, the “Vegas flu” kicked in once again.

Before the game, Head Coach Gerard Gallant made the call to stay with goaltender Maxime Lagace. He thought with the way he played in Vancouver that he earned another start. I also think rushing Malcolm Subban back probably wouldn’t be the smartest of ideas. Lagace and Subban look like the goaltending duo for the foreseeable future as netminders Marc-Andre Fleury and Oscar Dansk don’t look like they’re anywhere near close to playing.

The Golden Knights also made another switch to their lineup by taking out Oscar Lindberg in exchange for William Carrier. Gallant probably made the move because Lindberg made a careless turnover that resulted in a Vancouver goal on Thursday night. Carrier slotted right back in with Tomas Nosek and Pierre-Edouard Bellemare.

The game started off with a bang as William Karlsson came down the wing and flat out beat Quick’s five-hole. It only took the Golden Knights 55 seconds to strike first as the building was rocking early on. I couldn’t believe Quick let this goal in, a major gift by the former Conn Smyth trophy winner.

Vegas added a second goal nearly halfway through the second period when Cody Eakin came down the wing on a two on one with Brendan Leipsic. There was no play for the pass, so he elected to shoot, and he made no mistake ripping it over the shoulder of Quick. It was no doubt the best-looking goal of the night.

Two minutes later, Quick decides to play the puck behind the net, but he didn’t see Reilly Smith coming from his blind spot to take the puck away and feed it to Karlsson in front for his second goal of the evening. Another gift-wrapped goal after the Kings just made too many mistakes in this period. This marked the end of the night for the Quick as he only made six saves on nine shots.

A pivotal moment in the game came in the first period where Nate Schmidt saved a goal coming to Lagace’s rescue. The puck was about to cross the goal line as it broke through Lagace, but Schmidt came from behind and made sure the puck didn’t cross the goal line. An extremely veteran move by the young defenseman.

Los Angeles struck back for one goal in each of the last two periods. On the Kings first goal, Brad Hunt tried to make a hot pass that hopped over Erik Haula’s stick and trouble brewed from there. Alex Iafallo kept it in the offensive zone and ended up feeding Trevor Lewis who beat Lagace on the backhand. The second Kings goal came only because the Golden Knights got caught running around in their zone. Tanner Pearson sniped one in the slot after a slick setup from Adrian Kempe.

The Golden Knights tested out backup goaltender Darcy Kuemper all night but just couldn’t solve him. He robbed both Nosek and Jonathan Marchessault on grade A scoring chances. He was definitely the Kings best player throughout the game.

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In the end, it was Alex Tuch sealing the game away with the empty-netter with just over a minute to go. The home crowd went home happy as the Knights knocked off the Pacific Division-leading Kings 4-2.  Los Angeles remained in first place by the end of the night, but Vegas is only one point back with two games at hand.

My third star of the night has to go to the goaltender Maxime Lagace. He stopped 27 of 29 shots in his ninth straight start and earned his fourth victory of the year. I would have to say my second star would have to be Nate Schmidt. He was a plus three, played over 21 minutes and made a crucial save in the first period that could’ve turned the game around. And of course, my number one star is William Karlsson. He got the team going with the first goal and notched the eventual game-winner as well.

Next: Vegas Golden Knights Battle The Pacific Division Leading Los Angeles Kings.

All in all, great win by the Vegas Golden Knights. This win showed me that this team is here to stay and they can play with anybody. It’ll be fun to see how long they can keep this home winning streak which is now at seven games. But for now, the Knights are set to travel to Anaheim as Vegas takes on the Ducks on Wednesday night.