Knights on Ice — 4 Down, 12 To Go

Yesterday, the VGK started a crucial 4-game segment all against the same team, the Colorado Avalanche, the team most hockey pundits believe stand in their way, not only for the #1 seed in the Honda West Division, but a repeat appearance in the Western Conference Finals. If this were to happen, it would mark the 3rd time in 4 seasons that VGK would play in the Finals.

But before I get ahead of myself, let me say that yesterday’s 1-0 win was a good start to the 16 points that are for the taking here in this 4-game stretch. Yes, 4 games now equal 16 points, as all 56 games that VGK play in this shortened season are against teams in their own division. The 2 points you get for a win also means your division rival loses 2 points, hence the 4-point formula.

And yesterday, it was the same guy to the rescue. Marc-Andre Fleury stopped all 30 shots he faced from a team that has been averaging over 3.4 goals a game in their first 11 games and the Avs came into this game with a 4-0-1 record in their last 5 games before having their games postponed for COVID protocol after their Feb. 2 game.

Some pundits after the game were making excuses that the Avs hadn’t played in the previous 11 days and were not at the top of their game, thus making an easy mark for the red-hot VGK.

I will counter that thinking with the fact that Vegas was playing their 2nd game in 24 hours and actually have played their 4th game in 6 days, with Fleury in net for all 4 games. So, the Avs for sure had the fresher legs and were here in Vegas waiting on the VGK to return from San Jose so phooey on the rusty theory. When Vegas had their schedule halted for 9 days because of COVID, they came back with 3 straight wins and one heartbreaking 1-0 loss before winning the next 2 — 5 wins out of 6 coming off a similar layoff.

Some NHL analysts just will not give Vegas the credit they deserve. Especially considering they have 4 key players out of the lineup and they keep on plugging along with a little help from the Flower. Okay, make that a lot of help from the Flower.

Fleury made 30 saves on his way to his 2nd shutout in just his first 8 games and has given up only 11 goals in 8 games. He has won 4 of his last 5 starts. He leads the entire NHL with a 1.38 GAA and has a .944 save percentage.

Post-game, I was prepared to ask Coach DeBoer this question: With the way Fleury is playing, when Robin Lehner returns might you reevaluate the one-game-on one-game-off rotation you’ve used this season? Unfortunately, I wasn’t called on in the zoom meeting to pose this question to him. But you do recall his coaching decision in the Edmonton bubble, when he said he was playing the goaltender who gave the team the best chance to win. Right now, that goaltender is the Flower, no doubt about it. Yesterday’s shutout was the 63rd in his career.

The VGK power play that scored 3 PPG on Saturday against San Jose came up short yesterday and went 0-3 with the man advantage. Colorado has the #1 penalty kill in the league with a success rate of 90.5%, killing off 38 of 42 shorthanded situations, so it wasn’t going to be an easy task for the VGK. Vegas managed only 4 shots on Philipp Grubauer, the Avs’ goaltender, during the 3 power plays; he also stopped 23 of the 24 shots he faced.

The only shot that he didn’t stop was a blistering wrist shot from Max Pacioretty from the top of the right-wing faceoff circle after taking a nice stretch pass from Zac Whitecloud, who continues to impress. It was Pacioretty’s 7th goal of the season. Max also is the team leader in goals scored. Chandler Stephenson has 5 goals for the 2nd most goals scored so far this season.

Vegas now has a record of 10-2-1. It took them 13 games to achieve their 10th win, the fastest in their short franchise history. In the 2017-2018 season, it took the VGK 16 games to get to their 10th win.

With the powerhouse line of Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen, and Brandon Saad, both Alec Martinez and Alex Pietrangelo had their hands full. Martinez had over 24 minutes of ice time and Pietrangelo had 7 seconds shy of 26 minutes on the ice. Their top line accounted for 8 shots on Fleury out of the 30 he stopped. MacKinnon topped all Avs forwards with 22:34 of ice time. He saw a lot of both Martinez and Pietrangelo. As of the 22:34, the VGK were able to have their top 2 defenseman on the ice with them for 18:16 .

Fleury did admit in his post-game Zoom that his legs were tired after the back-to-back games. I believe with their off day, Fleury might opt out of the skate today and give his legs a well-deserved rest for tomorrow’s game. After that, the VGK will have a much-needed 3 days off before they head to their game up at Lake Tahoe.

My 3 Stars of the Game: Marc-Andre Fleury ( 30 saves for his 2nd shutout of the season)
2) Max Pacioretty (GWG his 7th goal in 13 games)
3) Zac Whitecloud (who set up the winning goal with a stretch pass from just inside of his blue line to Pacioretty waiting on the opposite blue line)

The next game is tomorrow at 7 p.m. vs. Colorado @ T-Mobile. The VGK will play two games after that against Colorado: 2/20 and 2/22.

Your comments and opinions are welcome here at Las Vegas Advisor or you may contact me directly at [email protected] or on my Facebook page or the Facebook page of Vegas Hockey Guy or on Twitter @TheRealJoePane

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Pacioretty’s goal

Fleury stones Bellemare