Knights on Ice — A Special-Team Nightmare Brought to You by the Vegas Golden Knights

For the 3^rd time this season, the once quick and offensive-minded VGK were shut out, 4-0. The shutout was delivered by the Minnesota Wild, a team that coming into last night’s game was in 12^th place out of the 15 teams in the Western Conference. The only teams that Minnesota were ahead of were the only 3 teams with a losing record in the entire Western Conference, Anaheim, San Jose, and L.A. Ironically, those 3 teams are in the Pacific Division and that’s the only reason that the VGK by default are still somewhat in the hunt for a playoff spot.

But their performance last night, and for that matter their last 4 periods, including the 3^rd period against the Carolina Hurricanes, is almost a sure way of the VGK saving their fan base thousands of dollars for playoff tickets. Because if things don’t change soon, there will be no games after Saturday April 4^th in Vancouver.

Their next 4 games are at T-Mobile and not one of them will be easy: the St. Louis Blues in 1^st place at 32-15-9, followed by the NY Islanders in 3^rd place at 33-16-6, then the Washington Capitals in 1^st place at 36-15-5 followed by Tampa Bay, 37-15-9 in 2^nd place. Vegas is 28-22-8 in 4^th place and the only reason for 4^th place is that the Pacific is worst division in the NHL.

The team’s inconsistency has not gone away. The spark that DeBoer was brought in to achieve hasn’t happened often enough to take notice of.

The special teams have been a nightmare and that’s putting it mildly; a few adjectives could be slipped in there. But I’m trying to remain somewhat positive and hopeful about a team with this much talent on paper dominating at least the Pacific Division.

At some point, far far away in another galaxy, the VGK were the highest-scoring team in the first periods of their games. Now they’ve given up 62 goals in the first period alone, which leads the league in a category you do not want to be first in.

In the recent past, the VGK were holding teams to single-digit shots in the first periods. Last night, the VGK had 2 shots on net in the first 12 minutes of the game and those 2 shots came when they were short-handed. They had a power play before the game was less than a minute old in which they had zero shots and looked totally out of sync.

Their first power play was uneventful for Vegas. In the second power play of the game, awarded to Minnesota, it appeared that the Wild had scored, as about 95% of the puck crossed the goal line before Brayden McNabb somehow stopped it and cleared it out. Players stopped skating on both teams and even Reilly Smith, who found the puck on his stick at center ice, slowed down waiting for the whistle to blow. But that never happened, so Smith continued toward Wild goaltender Alex Stalock, who made the save on Smith and for that matter saved every one of the 26 shots that Vegas had for his 3^rd shutout of the season. Minnesota wound up scoring on this power play seconds before it expired.

At the other end of the ice, Fleury lasted only 2 periods and gave up 4 goals on just 20 shots for a disappointing save percentage of .800. Malcolm Subban played the final 20 minutes and stopped all 5 shots he faced.

Stalock outplayed Fleury and the entire Minnesota team outplayed the VGK. They were clearly hungrier, while Vegas looked lethargic and completely uninspired. At this time of the year with just 24 games remaining and the VGK with just a one-point lead for the last wild card spot, you expect more. You’ve already replaced the coach and the trade deadline is 12 days away. There are few lifelines left for this team.

Even the return of William Karlsson didn’t provide any spark. In fact, Karlsson started the game centering the 3^rd line, which moved Eakin to the wing. Coach DeBoer later moved Karlsson back up to the Pacioretty-Stone line, looking for something, anything. Nothing he did created any spark or sense of urgency.

A true sign of the VGK’s lack of desire or urgency in responding to anything that Minnesota dished out happened when Ryan Reaves delivered a big hit on Minnesota defenseman Matt Dumba. Dumba wasn’t happy about that, even though it was a clean hit. On an ensuing shift, Dumba took a calculated slash on Reaves in the delicate area of the family jewels. Reaves was doubled over in pain on the ice and remained there for a good period of time before he could and make it back to the bench. There was no payback for this. ZERO. ZILCH! I know that when Reaves was brought here, it was said by then-GM McPhee that he was here to keep the bees off the honey. One would think that a response was coming, if not by Reaves himself, certainly by someone on the team to show that they stand shoulder to shoulder. And with the score 4-0 and the outcome of the game pretty much determined, one would expect a response.

In Vegas, dealers get fired if they’re “no call no show” for a scheduled shift. Last night, the VGK were no call no show. They surrendered 3 power-play goals in Minnesota’s 5 chances. They’ve given up 5 PPG in the last 2 games. They went 0-4 on their own power plays. Yes, it was a nightmare. Minnesota could have fired their coach, considering the bad start they got off, and didn’t. But yesterday their new GM Billy Guerin traded franchise player and Vegas native Jason Zucker and made a statement to his team: “If there’s quit, there will be more trades.”

Unlike the VGK who fired Gallant, Guerin kept the coach, traded a popular player, and made it clear he will clean house if he smells quit.

There is no sense in even listing the 3 stars of the game, because Vegas mailed this one in and made the Minnesota Wild look like Stanley Cup Champions.

This was a game that you want to forget if you are a VGK fan. And it’s a game that if you’re a VGK player, you need to look yourself in the mirror and ask, is this the best I got? Is this the best the team has? Is there any pride to this team? Any heart?

The next 4 games at T-Mobile will answer this question. What do you think?

Your comment and opinions are welcome here at Las Vegas Advisor or you may contact me directly at [email protected] or you can contact me at my Facebook page or the Facebook page of Vegas Hockey Guy.

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Joel Eriksson winning PPG