Vegas Golden Knights: Three stars from routing of the Sharks

Another day and another win over the San Jose Sharks for the Vegas Golden Knights who are off to a superb start in 2019-20.

A three-point night from Tomas Nosek helped propel the Vegas Golden Knights to a stunning 5-1 victory against the Sharks in San Jose’s home opener on Friday night, the second time in a matter of days that the Knights had got the better of their bitter rivals.

The Golden Knights are now 2-0-0 to start the year and they beat up on the Sharks in both games, outscoring them 9-2 while Marc-Andre Fleury stopped a combined total of 55 shots across the two games.

Vegas had their bottom six and penalty kill units to thank on Friday after both provided big contributions in the win against the Sharks, and it was an impressive showing up and down the lineup.

Jonathan Marchessault, Brayden McNabb and William Carrier scored their first goals of the year, while Tomas Nosek recorded the first three-point night of his career.

There were notable contributions from a plethora of players and we have picked our own Three Stars from the game but, first, here were the Official Three Stars:

1. Tomas Nosek
2. Mark Stone
3. Marc-Andre Fleury

Let’s now delve into our own Three Stars from the game, starting with an obvious choice for obvious reasons…

Third Star: Mark Stone

It was a two-point night for Mark Stone who recorded two assists against the San Jose Sharks, and he now has four points (one goal, three assists) in the opening two games of the 2019-20 NHL regular season.

Stone got a secondary helper on Tomas Nosek’s first goal after his pass was latched onto by Brandon Pirri, who came racing out of the penalty box before firing a shot at Martin Jones with Nosek in the right place at the right time to convert the rebound.

And Stone also assisted on Nosek’s second tuck of the night in what was a highlight-reel play, showcasing all of Stone’s qualities in one neat package.

On the penalty kill, Stone charged into the offensive zone and with a 2-on-1 developing, the wing tricked San Jose defenseman Erik Karlsson to slide early and that allowed Stone to feed Nosek with a delicious dish and the bottom six forward one-timed the feed beyond Aaron Dell.

Stone finished Friday’s game with a plus/minus rating of +2 in 17:53 minutes of total ice time, including 2:15 on the power play and 5:09 on the penalty kill. He also had four shots on goal, one hit, one blocked shot and two takeaways.

It was a dominant display from the 2018-19 Selke Trophy finalist and Stone is showing early this year just how crucial he will be for the Golden Knights.