The Vegas Golden Knights defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins 3-2 on Saturday, and have now won 3 in a row and 4 of their last 5 games played. Vegas and Pittsburgh played a scoreless 1st period, and the away team picked up a pair of goals in the 2nd frame to make it 2-0 heading into intermission. The Golden Knights have been in this situation before, and folded, but that wasn’t the case this time.
Jonathan Marchessault once again stepped up in the absence of Jack Eichel, and tallied his 20th goal of the season 5:18 into the 3rd period. Marchessault has goals in 3 straight games now, and points in 5 of his last 7 games played.
Pavel Dorofeyev responded with a goal of his own just 1:34 later, and the Golden Knights were back in it with just over a half of period to play. He has been a decent contributor for the team this season, and sits with a stat line of 6-7-13 in 26 games played playing a tertiary role.
The Golden Knights were firing on all cylinders at this point, and went on the power play shortly after this. They failed to score with the man-advantage, but were able to get something going shortly after time expired following a stretch pass from Alex Pietrangelo to Ivan Barbashev who then found Brendan Brisson right in the slot.
Barbashev had a slow start to the season with 8 points in his first 24 games played, and has 6 goals and 9 assists for 15 points over the last 22 games for Vegas. The team still wants to get a little more out of him, but he is starting to put it together again which is key at a time in which the Golden Knights are battling multiple injuries.
The Golden Knights held on the rest of the way, and earned a much needed 2 points to keep pace in the Pacific Division. Vegas was able to overcome going 0 for 4 on the power play, and Logan Thompson once again was wonderful in net making 23 saves on 25 shots.
Here’s a look at how things went from the expected goals battle, and you can clearly see the impact a strong 3rd period had for the Golden Knights.
The Golden Knights return to action on Monday, and they will face the New Jersey Devils in the 1st game of a road trip which will also see them face the New York Islanders, New York Rangers, and Detroit Red Wings before going into the All-Star break.