Last night, two teams were playing at T-Mobile. One of them was in desperation mode (Arizona), while the other (Vegas) played like it didn’t matter.
I asked Coach Gallant in his post-game conference, “Was tonight’s result a case of facing a desperate team or were the VGK on auto pilot?”
His response was, “Come on, Joe. You know the answer. It’s a mental thing.”
Yes, I did know the answer. But when we query players or coaches, we’re asking for the benefit of our readers and audience, who want to hear it directly from the team members and not just assume that our opinion is correct. Last night’s 4-1 loss to the Arizona Coyotes was a clear case of the VGK just mailing it in. Gallant knew it even before I asked him, just like I did, along with anyone else who was paying attention.
Vegas played at least the 20 minutes of the first period, though not so much for the remaining 40. Arizona needed to win this game and their final game as they trailed the last wildcard playoff spot by 4 points. They also needed the Colorado Avalanche to lose their last two games. Unfortunately for the Coyotes, Colorado, losing 2-0 at home to the Winnipeg Jets, stormed back to win in overtime, which eliminated Arizona.
Arizona knew the results of the Colorado game before they stepped back onto the ice for the third period at T-Mobile. Still, they played the period like it mattered, which is a credit to the entire Arizona organization.
Arizona hasn’t made the playoffs since the 2011-12 season. This team played their hearts out, not only last night, but throughout a season of numerous injuries and losing their starting goaltender Antti Raanta, who played nine games early in the season, was injured, returned to the lineup to play only three more games, then went down for the rest of the year.
Speaking of goaltenders and injuries, Marc-André Fleury was back in the lineup after being a scratch with a lower-body injury. Or was it an upper-body injury? Or was it just time off to rest him? You make the call for yourself. My opinion is it was to rest him and it was a smart move. It looked like third place was where the VGK would wind up no matter what, so why not rest Fleury, whose workload was immense with 59 games played?
This also gave the team and organization a good long look at Malcolm Subban, who is on the last year of his contract and will be a restricted free agent for the 2019-2020 season.
Fleury missed the last nine games and hadn’t played since March 15. He looked good, even though he gave up 4 goals on 41 shots. Two came off grievous giveaways deep in the VGK defensive zone. The number of shots he faced was a blessing, as it gave him a chance to work on his timing, along with facing traffic in front of him. Fleury had won his previous six starts before leaving the lineup. The loss last night brings his record for the season to 35-20-5. He has won all but eight of the VGK wins; Subban won those eight. It also was the VGK’s sixth loss in their last seven games.
Last night’s game was the last home game of the season. Vegas won 24 games out of 41 this season, compared to last year’s Vegas 29 of 41. Those five games are worth 10 points, while the difference between second and third place in the Pacific Division is just four points. If they had won just two more games, the race for home ice would still be up for grabs. Now they’ll have to win at least one game in San Jose to make it to the second round of the playoffs. Not impossible, but the luxury of having home ice can be the difference in advancing.
In an ironic twist, in the final home game of the 2017-2018 season, William Karlsson scored the goal that set the Internet on fire with his between-the-legs breakaway shorthanded goal against the San Jose Sharks. Last night, Wild Bill had another breakaway and attempted the same exact move on Arizona goaltender Darcy Kuemper that he pulled on Sharks’ goaltender Martin Jones. This time the between-the-legs pass to himself failed, or else we could have had a VGK deja vu on home-game 41 like last year.
That missed chance by Karlsson in the first period should have been a signal that the rest of the night was going to be a failed attempt at playing and matching Arizona’s intensity and desperation.
The only VGK lead came off a giveaway deep in the Arizona end that resulted in Paul Stastny pushing the puck to Mark Stone, who slipped in a backhanded goal. It was Vegas’ only goal for the entire game. That lead lasted a mere 57 seconds, until Richard Panik scored his 14th goal to tie the game at 1-1.
Derek Stephan added two goals of his own, his 14th and 15th of the season, in the second period to increase the Arizona lead to 3-1.
Conor Garland added the fourth and final goal 12:09 into the third period to send the mentally unprepared VGK to their 12th loss of the season at T-Mobile.
What makes this loss sting even more than it should is Arizona is offensively challenged, scoring only 207 goals in 80 games. For a team that’s averaging 2.5 goals a game to score four on the road against a world-class goaltender, you know it’s just not a normal night. Only two other teams have scored less: Anaheim (194) and L.A. (195). Like Gallant pointed out to me, “Come on, Joe. It’s a mental thing.”
Even though Paul Stastny assisted on Mark Stone’s goal, both of them, along with Shea Theodore, wound up with a -3. Theodore had a game he would like to forget. Actually, the entire team minus Fleury would like to quickly forget this game and focus on tomorrow’s game against the Kings.
There’s no need to panic. If you have a good memory, you’ll recall that last season, the VGK lost their last two games of the year, including being blown out by Calgary 7-1 in a game where Fleury was replaced by Subban after the second period.
Vegas recovered from that blowout by defeating the Kings in four straight games, with Fleury having a shutout in Game 1 and another in the series clincher. L.A. scored only three goals total in the four-game series. Goaltending wins playoff series and with Fleury in the net, anything is possible.
My 3 Stars of the Game: Derek Stephan (2 goals, including the game-winner), Lawson Crouse (2 assists on both of Stephan’s goals), and Darcy Kemper (1 goal on 38 shots).
Game 82 is the last of the season before the real season begins. It’s tomorrow at L.A. versus the Kings at 7:30 p.m.
Your comments and opinions are welcome and appreciated here at Las Vegas Advisor (to comment, you just have to register on the site, which takes all of 30 seconds and is free, of course). You can also contact me directly at [email protected] or visit my Facebook page, Vegas Hockey Guy.
And for the most comprehensive coverage of the Vegas Golden Knights’ historic inaugural season, take a look at our book Vegas Golden Knights—How a First-Year Expansion Team Healed Las Vegas and Shocked the Hockey World.
The videos:
Coach Gallant Part 1 and Part 2
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Always enjoy your postings. Knowledgeable and to the point.