Amid their worst losing stretch of the season, the Vegas Golden Knights host the St. Louis Blues in a Martin Luther King Jr. Day matinee Monday in Las Vegas.
It’s the first game of a home-and-home set between the two teams, with the rematch on Thursday in St. Louis.
Vegas, tied with the Edmonton Oilers for first place in the Pacific Division with 61 points, has lost three consecutive games, matching its longest skid of the season. The Golden Knights have also dropped five of their last six outings, the team’s worst six-game output over 46 contests.
“It’s not super ideal, right?” captain Mark Stone said after a 5-3 loss at Chicago on Saturday, which ended an 0-3 road trip. “The good thing is it’s nothing they’re doing. It’s preventable mistakes by us.”
The loss to the Blackhawks, who have the fewest points in the NHL, was arguably the low point of the season for Vegas. The Golden Knights also fell 3-2 at Carolina on Friday after starting the trip with a 5-3 loss at Nashville on Tuesday.
“A little adversity is good at this time of year, but it’s only good if you work your way out of it,” Stone said. “We’ve got to go home and get back to the drawing board and be ready to battle and find a way to win a game.”
Vegas played catch-up often during its trip. The Golden Knights fell behind Nashville 4-0 and trailed Chicago 3-1 after the Blackhawks scored three times in a 3:42 span late in the first period.
“That’s an issue for us right now,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said. “Our bad stretches, we’re not putting out fires and limiting damage. We did a much better job of that earlier in the year.”
St. Louis had a two-game winning streak snapped with a 4-2 loss against Utah on Saturday in Salt Lake City.
The Blues, who are fifth in the Central Division and three points behind Calgary for the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference, have yet to win three games in a row this season.
St. Louis coach Jim Montgomery raised some eyebrows in the loss to Utah when he benched his top line of Robert Thomas, Pavel Buchnevich and Jake Neighbours for the final half of the opening period after Utah built a 3-1 lead with three goals over a 4 1/2-minute span.
“They were minus-2,” Montgomery said. “I was going with the players I thought were trying to get it done.”
When asked about being benched, Thomas said, “Our line just can’t get scored on. Plain and simple. That’s it.
“We’ve got to be better, need to be consistent. Whoever’s going to play. That’s the message (Montgomery) sent. We got scored on twice so we didn’t deserve to be out there.”
Now the Blues will try to rebound against a Golden Knights team that has compiled a 23-5-2 record against Western Conference foes.
“We have a tough schedule coming up,” Thomas said. “We’ve got them twice back-to-back, home and away, so it’s a big test for us. Obviously, they’re a great team, and we’ve got to find a way to start winning games.”
Monday marks the second meeting between the two teams. Jack Eichel and Ivan Barbashev each had a goal and an assist as Vegas won the first one, 4-3, on Oct. 11 in Las Vegas.
–Field Level Media
