Vegas Golden Knights: Sparks stands on his head as Avs swept aside

Notes and Stats from the game

This is how the Vegas Golden Knights lined up in full:

Carrier-Duke-Tuch
Pirri-Nosek-Zykov
Leschyshyn-Roy-Kolesar
Goulbourne-Jones-Elvenes

Merrill-Whitecloud
Schmidt-Coghlan
Hague-Lernout

Sparks

And here are some key stats from the game:

• Shots On Goal – VGK: 28 – COL: 24
• FO% – VGK: 42% – COL: 58%
• PP – VGK: 2/5 – COL: 0/5
• PIM – VGK: 10 – COL: 10
• HITS – VGK: 19 – COL: 11
• BLKS – VGK: 10 – COL: 5
• GVA – VGK: 3 – COL: 8

Let’s check out a summary of the scoring from the game:

• Valentin Zykov (1) – unassisted – 4:08 / 1st
• Brandon Pirri (1) PPG – Nosek (1), Tuch (1) – 2:49 / 2nd
• Nicolas Hague (1) – Nosek (2), Pirri (1) – 1:23 / 3rd
• Nicolas Roy (1) – Leschyshyn (1), Kolesar (1) – 2:09 / 3rd
• Brandon Pirri (2) PPG – Zykov (1), Schmidt (1) – 16:04 / 3rd

Here are some notes on the game – we will be doing a deeper dive on what we learned in a Takeaways piece on Wednesday…

• • The night belonged to players battling for a spot on the opening night roster. On paper, the standout player was Brandon Pirri who recorded two goals and one assist for a three point night and finished with a plus/minus rating of +2 in 14:45 of ice time and 3:10 of power play time.
  • Rookie defenseman Nic Hague also had himself a night with one goal and a plus/minus rating of +2, logging 22:33 of ice time including time on both the power play and on the penalty kill. He impressed in all situations and he should be considered among the frontrunners to crack the opening night roster.
  • Tomas Nosek is holding out hopes to win a spot as the third line left wing and he too enjoyed a productive night, tallying two assists for two points in 16:44 of ice time, including 3:08 minutes of power play time and a further 2:39 of time on the PK.
  • Valentin Zykov also did his case of cracking the opening night roster no harm at all after tallying a goal and an assist for two points, including recording a sublime dish on Brandon Pirri’s second goal.
  • There were also encouraging signs from Nicolas Roy, the bottom six grinder who was acquired from the Carolina Hurricanes in the off-season as part of the trade that sent forward Erik Haula to Raleigh. Roy logged time on the penalty kill and also recorded a goal.

• However, the most impressive performance of the night belonged to goalie Garret Sparks, who stopped all 24 of the shots he faced with a 1.000 Save Percentage on his Vegas Golden Knights debut. Sparks will likely begin the year in the AHL with the Chicago Wolves but it is encouraging for the franchise to know that they have depth in the goaltending department.

Overall, it was another encouraging and positive night for the Vegas Golden Knights who take on the LA Kings in their third game of the preseason on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. PT.