Watch out, the Vegas Golden Knights are coming after beating the New Jersey Devils 4-3 at Prudential Center on Tuesday to rack up their fourth consecutive win.
It wasn’t a vintage effort but the Vegas Golden Knights overcame a sluggish start to get the job done and improve to 2-0-0 on this road trip.
Jonathan Marchessault was the star of the show with a natural hat trick, while Chandler Stephenson marked his Vegas debut with a goal.
The Devils, who fired Head Coach John Hynes hours before the game, looked to put on a show for Interim Head Coach Alain Nasreddine and they got on the board first thanks to Kyle Palmieri.
Stephenson made it a tied game though with his first goal in his first game as a Golden Knight, but Jesper Bratt gave the Devils the lead again heading into the third period.
However, good teams find a way to win and that’s exactly what Vegas did as Marchessault scored a final period hat trick to stun New Jersey, although Nico Hischier did strike to set up a thrilling finish.
But the Golden Knights, led by Malcolm Subban‘s 32 saves, held on to pick up their fourth consecutive win and maintain their perfect record on this road trip, which wraps up against the New York Islanders on Thursday.
Let’s delve into the game by breaking it down period-by-period…
The Game
First Period – New Jersey dominated from the first drop of the puck as they tried to respond to the events of a few hours earlier where their Head Coach John Hynes was fired.
And it took a few minutes for the Vegas Golden Knights to register their first shot on goal as Deryk Engelland ripped a shot off the post.
Vegas was struggling to keep possession of the puck while it was a physical start to the game, and Malcolm Subban was having to stand on his head early after making some big stops on Jesper Bratt and Taylor Hall.
But, Subban was unable to prevent the Devils from landing the first blow of the night as Kyle Palmieri latched onto a breakout pass from Damon Severson before beating Subban with a wrister at 16:31.
The Golden Knights were outshot 17-7 by a bad Devils team in an ugly first period and you could tell that Vegas had played the night before.
Second Period – New Jersey was 5-3-4 when scoring first this season heading into the game, but they began to lose their grip on the game.
Tomas Nosek rang a puck against the post before the new boy, Chandler Stephenson, made a brilliant first impression by recording a goal on his Vegas Golden Knights debut.
After Nosek won the puck back, Alex Tuck threw it across the crease and Stephenson displayed his speed to arrive at the backdoor and beat Mackenzie Blackwood with a one-timer at 5:24.
Ryan Reaves came back into the game after taking a puck to the body earlier in the contest, but the Knights were soon dealt another setback.
Jesper Bratt was spotted by Damon Severson and the forward cranked a one-timer from the top of the circle past Malcolm Subban at 14:17.
However, Vegas Head Coach Gerard Gallant challenged for goalie interference with Taylor Hall blocking Subban, but it was ruled a good goal after Paul Stastny was adjudged to have made contact with Hall which caused the Devils forward to have contact with Subban.
New Jersey took a slender 2-1 lead into the final period and they had outshot the Knights again, this time by a margin of 11-10.
Third Period – As already mentioned, good teams and contending teams find a way to dig out a result even when they aren’t at their best, and that’s exactly what the Vegas Golden Knights did.
The dynamic top line of Reilly Smith, William Karlsson and Jonathan Marchessault combined as the latter crashed the net and deflected Karlsson’s feed past Mackenzie Blackwood to tie the game at 1:05.
And Marchessault struck again at 5:04 to give the Golden Knights the lead after the forward redirected Deryk Engelland’s wrister from the point beyond Blackwood.
Blackwood atoned for that goal by making a sublime glove save on Max Pacioretty from the slot area, and the New Jersey goalie was being kept busy.
Vegas was pressing, they were dominating and they got their just rewards at 9:40 as Marchessault got to his own rebound to complete his natural hat trick on the power play.
The Devils answered back immediately, however, as Nico Hischier ripped a wrist shot on the rush past Malcolm Subban on his glove side at 10:00.
New Jersey pulled Blackwood with 1:45 to play but the Golden Knights did what they had to in order to finish the job and make it four straight wins.
Let’s go over some notes and stats from the game…