The Vegas Golden Knights were sitting pretty after 40 minutes of play with a 3-1 lead in their first home game of the preseason on Wednesday vs. the Los Angeles Kings. The team ultimately fell 4-3 in overtime as Akil Thomas completed his hat trick with two goals in the third, and Tyler Madden netted the game-winning goal toward the end of the bonus frame.
Adin Hill was between the pipes for the whole game, and stopped 20 of the 24 shots that came his way, with all the goals scored coming at even strength. On the other side J-F Berube stopped 23 of the 26 shots faced, with 10 shots coming in the third period and OT.
In terms of pace it was a pretty basic preseason game, and both sides had ample special teams opportunities. The Kings’ power play went 0 for 4, with the Golden Knights PK going 4 for 4, and the Golden Knights power play went 1 for 3, with the Kings PK going 2 for 3 respectively.
The lone power play goal for Vegas was a beauty from Jonathan Marchessault assisted by Mark Stone and Jack Eichel.
The pairing of Eichel and Marchessault also teamed up on the team’s first goal of the game scored by Brendan Brisson, a forward eagerly trying to earn a roster spot.
The final goal scorer was Ben Hutton, a sight you don’t see often as the journeyman NHLer has found the back of the net just 22 times in 468 regular season games.
The biggest fireworks of the game came when Mark Stone took a bodycheck along the boards while it was still 2-0.
The hit itself was pretty innocuous, but I can understand someone like Stone who has missed considerable time in recent years due to injury not expecting something like that in an early preseason game.
In related news, the team recently announced roster cuts to bring things down to 44, and I’d expect more to come soon. Here’s the list of players no longer in camp via the team’s release.
The following players were assigned to the Henderson Silver Knights of the American Hockey League, the Savannah Ghost Pirates of the ECHL or their respective junior teams: Michael Bullion, Noah Carroll, Ty Cheveldayoff, Daniel D’Amato, Joe Fleming, Robbie Fromm-Delorme, Patrick Guay, Ben Hemmerling, Brandon Hickey, Jett Jones, Jordan Papirny, Simon Pinard, Mason Primeau, Matyas Sapovaliv, Alex Swetlikoff and Tuomas Uronen.
The preseason will continue for Vegas on Friday when they take on the Arizona Coyotes at T-Mobile Arena. I’d expect that lineup to start looking closer to a regular season one, while also including some players fighting for a job.