It took a Shootout but the Vegas Golden Knights were able to squeeze by the Ottawa Senators by a score of 3-2 at T-Mobile Arena on Thursday night.
The Vegas Golden Knights prepared for a three-game road trip in perfect fashion by edging a close-fought contest against the Senators, with both netminders on top of their games for their respective teams.
Reilly Smith‘s golden touch in-front of goal continued as he netted his sixth goal of the year from a Jonathan Marchessault helper, although it was a tied game in no time thanks to Thomas Chabot‘s sublime wrister after toe-dragging the puck past Paul Stastny.
Nick Holden ensured that the Golden Knights would take a slender lead into the first intermission break, however, after sending an absolute rocket of a one-timer past Anders Nilsson on the power play..
Both Nilsson and Marc-Andre Fleury were in absolute unstoppable form between the pipes which contributed to a scoreless second period, with the former going on to record an NHL career-high 52 saves for the Senators.
Overtime was confirmed, though, when Jean-Gabriel Pageau pounced on a Tyler Ennis rebound but neither team could grab the winner at 3-on-3.
So the game’s fate would be decided by a shootout and it went five rounds with Jonathan Marchessault eventually coming up with the goods to win it for Vegas, with Brandon Pirri and Shea Theodore also successful in the shootout for the Knights.
Here were our three takeaways from the Golden Knights’ 3-2 success over the Ottawa Senators…