The Vegas Knights Are The Best Team in the NHL When Healthy
By Evan Mead
The Vegas Knights have had a rough go lately. There has been a significant increase in injuries to some of the most important players on the Knights, but what could the team look like down the stretch?
The Vegas Golden Knights have had a unfortunate turn of events. After using the off-season to further develop and improve their team, within just two games, that’s not the case anymore.
To start the season, there were expectations that this was going to be the year they finally won it all. However, Mattias Janmark started the season on the COVID list, and Alex Tuch is out with a shoulder injury, but that’s not the worst of it. To go along with two key players being out, Mark Stone is now out for a period of time that has yet to be determined, and his first-line teammate Max Pacioretty. So how much is that going to stunt their team? We’ll given they are only two games in, doesn’t mean we can’t look ahead.
So if you look ahead in the season, what are some of the potential lineups we could see?
Well prior to the injuries, there has been some movement between the younger guys on the roster. Once things start getting back to normal, and people start to get healthy, what is the consensus lineup going to look like?
Forwards
Max Pacioretty-Chandler Stephenson-Mark Stone
Jonathan Marchessault-William Karlsson-Reilly Smith
Alex Tuch-Mattias Janmark-Evgenii Dadonov
Peyton Krebs-Nolan Patrick-Keegan Kolesar
Defenseman
Alex Pietrangelo-Alec Martinez
Shea Theodore-Brayden McNabb
Nicolas Hague-Zach Whitecloud
Goalies
Robin Lehner
Laurent Brossit
Extras
Brett Howden, Nic Roy, Dylan Coghlan
Looking at that lineup for a game-to-game basis, it matches up better than just about any team in the league. Although their first line isn’t necessarily a “top tier line”, with Max Pacioretty, Mark Stone, and Chandler Stephenson, they are lacking a star center. However, they have very good depth at the center position that gives them a lot of different variations when it comes to shaking things up.
It’s hard to say that they will be able to have all those guy’s healthy at some point this season the way things are going, but there is hope. The injuries that are currently sidelining what feels like their entire roster, isn’t projected to take them to long to recover. Based upon reports, it’s possible that Alex Tuch could return in late January as well.
The question that still remains is: When everyone is healthy, just how dangerous is their team going to be?