After finishing a stretch in which they played nine of 13 games on the road, the Vegas Golden Knights open a three-game homestand versus the Vancouver Canucks on Thursday night in Las Vegas.
The Golden Knights play five of their final six games of the month on home ice, with just a short trip to San Jose on Dec. 27 serving as their lone road contest.
Vegas is 11-3-0 at home this season and leads the Pacific Division by three points over the Los Angeles Kings. The favorable stretch presents an opportunity for the Golden Knights to perhaps catch the Winnipeg Jets, who hold a four-point lead for the top spot in the NHL standings.
After a grinding three-games-in-four-nights road stretch that saw the Golden Knights sandwich wins at Winnipeg (3-2 in overtime) and Minnesota (3-2) around a 6-3 loss at defending Western Conference champion Edmonton, Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy welcomes a chance to unpack his suitcase for a while.
“I think for us, it’s just being back at home now, we spent a lot of time on the road, we’ll (try to) take advantage of the schedule in front of you,” Cassidy said. “Easier said than done.”
The Golden Knights got a much-needed three-day break following the win over the Wild on Sunday night. Just two of their final six games in December are against teams with winning records, and none are part of back-to-backs.
“You’ve got to win the games that you get some rest in between,” Cassidy said. “(There) shouldn’t be (a) lack of energy so we shouldn’t be making lots of mental mistakes but we’ll see. Got to play the games.”
First up is Vancouver, which will be playing the second game of a back-to-back that began with a 3-2 overtime loss against the host Utah Hockey Club on Wednesday.
Vancouver held a 2-0 lead early in third period on goals by Danton Heinen and Dakota Joshua but Utah rallied in the final 11 minutes. Utah received goals by Clayton Keller and Dylan Guenther, the latter a power-play score with 4:30 left after Tyler Myers was called for a cross-check on Keller.
Mikhail Sergachev then won it for the home team with just 11.4 seconds left in overtime when he beat goalie Thatcher Demko with a backhand shot that sailed between the pads to conclude a 2-on-1 break with Logan Cooley.
“We let our foot off the gas,” Joshua said. “They’re a good team and they took advantage of us and we let that one get away.”
“We had a 2-0 lead and you’ve got to lock it down,” Vancouver coach Rick Tocchet said. “Just got to lock these games down. It’s 2-0 and you’ve got to stay with it.”
This will be the first of four meetings between Vancouver and Vegas. The teams split their four games last season with each team winning one on the road.
“We’ve got to be ready to go (on Thursday),” Joshua said. “We can’t come out with the same start that we did tonight. Vegas is sitting there waiting so we’ve got to be ready to go right from the puck drop.”
–Field Level Media
