The Vegas Golden Knights return home to T-Mobile Arena as the first-round series against the San Jose Sharks shifts to Vegas for Games 3 and 4. The Knights pulled off an impressive bounce-back win Friday in Game 2, evening up the best-of-seven series at 1-1. It’s now a best-of-five series in which Vegas holds home-ice advantage, and there is sure to be a lot of buzz in the arena tonight as the Vegas crowd gets its first taste of postseason hockey since June.
Mark Stone leads all players in the series with three goals in two games, and his energy has brought a lot to the Knights’ lineup. Discipline continues to be an issue (a serious one), so that’s the main area of focus tonight. Vegas is playing with fire by giving the Sharks’ power play so many opportunities; the Knights need to keep things at 5-on-5 to give themselves the best shot of taking a 2-1 series lead.
San Jose will be without a key member of the blue line as defenseman Marc-Edouard Vlasic will not suit up tonight after taking a shot to the head in Game 2. Tim Heed will draw into the lineup, though Brent Burns and Erik Karlsson will be relied on heavily once again.
Here are the projected lineups for both clubs:
Golden Knights
Marchessault — Karlsson — Smith
Pacioretty — Stastny — Stone
Nosek — Eakin — Tuch
Carrier — Bellemare — Reaves
Theodore — McNabb
Engelland — Schmidt
Merrill — Miller
Fleury
Subban
Sharks
Meier (#28) — Couture (#39) — Pavelski (#8)
Kane (#9) — Hertl (#48) — Nyquist (#14)
Sorensen (#20) — Thornton (#19) — Labanc (#62)
Haley (#18) — Goodrow (#23) — M. Karlsson (#68)
Ryan (#47) — Burns (#88)
Dillon (#4) — E. Karlsson (#65)
Heed (#72) — Braun (#61)
Jones (#31)
Dell (#30)
ICYMI, here is the preview for tonight’s game.
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