Vegas Golden Knights — Vegas Starts the Season with 3 Wins, but Don’t Be Fooled

Yes, the VGK beat the Arizona Coyotes last night by a score of 4-2 for their 3rd straight win to open the season, but there are issues with this team. Those will be exposed by a formidable opponent if they continue to refuse to play 60 minutes and go long stretches without even registering a shot on goal, which unfortunately even included one of their power plays last night. They went without a shot for the last 6 minutes of the first period and had a similar episode in the 2nd period.

They were lucky that the first 3 games were against Anaheim and Arizona, because if they’d played Colorado or St. Louis or Minnesota, they very well could be 0-3 instead of 3-0.

If they had to play only the 3rd period, they’d be unbeatable. In the first 3 games, the VGK has owned the 3rd, scoring 7 goals in the final 20 minutes and 1 goal just 7 seconds into the OT period. They’ve also held the opposition to no goals in the 3rd period and you can thank Robin Lehner and Marc-Andre Fleury for that.

This team on paper should be dominating teams every night, but so far this season, they’re lucky to be undefeated. They fell behind once again last night 2-0, giving up a shorthanded goal and a power-play goal. Their power play looks anemic and gave up a shorthanded goal to open the scoring when the often-reliable Mark Stone gave the puck away with an ill-advised pass at the blue line. Vegas even had a 2-man advantage and did nothing with it. Vegas has had a 2-man advantage 16 times in its history and have scored a dismal 2 goals in 16 attempts. During the 1:03 of the 2-man advantage, they managed only 2 shots on goal, even though they had the puck the entire time.

They’re lucky to have 2 goaltenders who are currently keeping them afloat and allowing them to play maybe 20 minutes out of 60 and still somehow win games they have had no business winning. In the first game of the season, they opened up with 2 first-period goals, but then went on cruise control, allowing Anaheim back into the game. Mark Stone took the team on his back in the 3rd period and willed them a victory.

The VGK have beaten Arizona 9 out of 13 games in their history, but 4 of the wins were decided by 1 goal. Last night’s game would have been the 5th game decided by just one goal also if Reilly Smith hadn’t scored from 185 feet away into the empty net as Arizona not only pulled their goaltender, but had a power play to boot for a 6-on-4 advantage to make things interesting for the fans who, I can guarantee you, were on the edge of their couches or bar stools watching the game clock that didn’t seem to move.

Prior to the Vegas goals scored by Max Pacioretty, the best 2 offensive opportunities Vegas had were while they were killing a penalty with both William Karlsson and Tomas Nosek streaking in on Darcy Kuemper on breakaways. Kuemper stoned them both and has been really good against Vegas, giving up only 5 goals in his last 4 games vs. Vegas prior to this contest.

Max Pacioretty continues to light the red light with 3 goals in his first 3 games. Reilly Smith’s first goal last night tied the game at 2-2 off a behind-the-back and between-the-legs pass from William Karlsson who duplicated the Ryan Raves pass to Tomas Nosek in their opening game. Just think about this: Revo is giving skill moves to William Karlsson. Bet you never thought you’d see this written anywhere.

Then there were 3 of the 4 VGK goals last night that should be put on a video loop of “Hey! Watch How This Goal Is Scored.” First there was Max Pacioretty, who scored from behind the net when he banked it off of Kuemper pads; Kuemper was scrambling back to the front of the net to cover Pacioretty’s wraparound on the opposite side of the net, except Max didn’t go there and banked it off of Kuemper. Then there was Chandler Stephenson’s goal that he scored without having a stick. Zach Whitecloud’s shot from the point was headed wide of the net; Stephenson had his stick knocked out of his hands and when he tried to bend down to retrieve it, Whitecloud’s slapshot from the right point hit him square in the back and went in. To top it off, the 4th and final goal scored by Reilly Smith came from 185 feet away as he had the luxury of shooting the puck down the ice and not having to worry about it being called icing, as Arizona was on the power play. It was a perfect shot that went right into the middle of the net to assure a 4-2 VGK 3-game winning streak.

Vegas finally abandoned the 5 defensemen and 13 forwards experiment last night, scratching Cody Glass and dressing 6 defensemen, which is the norm. Nicholas Hague was the 6th defenseman inserted and one would think that DeBoer would never put 2 rookies together on defense. But Zach Whitecloud continues to impress anyone who is watching and he was paired with the other rookie. DeBoer has so much confidence in Zach that he had him out there at the end of the game with Arizona having a 6-on-4 advantage that speaks volumes for Zach and his future with the VGK.

My 3 Stars of the Game: Reilly Smith (2 goals), Max Pacioretty (1G and in a goal-scoring zone; Max has never scored 3 goals in his first 3 games in his entire 12-year career), and William Karlsson (whose pass to Reilly Smith was worth the price of admission). Wait, there were no fans in the building, but it was a highly skilled play that Karlsson learned from Revo😊

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Reilly Smith’s first goal

Max Pacioretty’s goal

Chandler Stephenson’s goal without his stick