The Vegas Golden Knights opened their four-game road trip with a 3-2 overtime loss to the Pittsbrgh Penguins Tuesday night at PPG Paints Arena, dropping their second consecutive game after winning four in a row.
The Golden Knights never led but played a strong road game and managed to net the equalizer in the waning seconds of regulation to force overtime and pick up a point. However, Pittsburgh’s Erik Karlsson scored the game-winner less than a minute into extra time for the win.
The Golden Knights (38-19-7) now lead Edmonton by five points after the Oilers lost 3-2 to Buffalo on Monday.
Both Brett Howden and Ivan Barbashev were out of the lineup. Cole Schwindt and Jonas Rondbjerg filled in but played just 3:34 and 6:02, respectively, as Vegas shortened its bench after falling behind.
With the secondary assist on Pavel Dorofeyev’s second-period goal, Jack Eichel tied William Karlsson’s franchise record for most points in a season with 78. Dorofeyev and Noah Hanifin both recorded two points, but the Golden Knights left an important point on the table against a non-playoff team.
For the second game in a row, the Golden Knights fell into a multi-goal hole. On Tuesday, it was Sidney Crosby who accounted for both of Pittsburgh’s regulation strikes.
The first came on the power play. Vegas took two uncharacteristic high-sticking penalties in the offensive zone in the first period, with the second leading to Crosby’s 22nd goal of the season. The goal was the result of a strong feed from Rickard Rakell, who found Crosby alone in front.
Vegas struggled to contain Crosby, who led the Penguins with six shot attempts, four shots and 0.35 individual expected goals at 5-on-5.
Crosby’s second of the night, which doubled Pittsburgh’s lead just over three minutes into the second period, was reminiscent of a few of Los Angeles’ goals from Sunday’s game. Crosby was given direct, uncontested access to an open lane to the net, where he took his time, picked his spot and beat Ilya Samsonov under the pad.
The Golden Knights outshot the Penguins in all three periods but happened to catch Tristan Jarry in arguably his best performance of the season. He was the difference early and was excellent throughout, and he kept Vegas off the board at 5-on-5 all night.
However, as soon as the opportunity presented itself, the red-hot Vegas power play came through. Dorofeyev scored his 25th goal of the year (and 11th on the power play), beating Jarry from the circle at 14:29 of the middle frame to cut the deficit in half.
From there, the Golden Knights continued to push, and for the second time this season, they had a dominant third period against the Penguins. It started with a key penalty kill, and Vegas proceeded to control play the rest of the way, holding an impressive 19-4 edge in shots along with a 34-15 advantage in Corsi and 16-8 lead in scoring chances.
Tomas Hertl and Eichel had glorious chances in the third, but puck luck was not on Vegas’ side.
But with just seven seconds remaining and the extra attacker on the ice, Hanifin took advantage of a perfect screen by Hertl and beat Jarry to even things up and force overtime.
In the end, the Golden Knights would only come away with one point, however, as Karlsson called game 49 seconds later for the 3-2 win.
Though the Golden Knights converged on Evgeni Malkin, Samsonov appeared to be caught off guard on the play and was beaten cleanly.
Samsonov finished the game with 14 saves on 17 shots for an .824 save percentage.
When asked about the difference in the game, head coach Bruce Cassidy pointed to goaltending. “Their goaltender outplayed ours in the end,” he said.
The Golden Knights got off to a slow start, but it was nothing like Sunday’s lackluster effort against the Kings.
“The LA game, we didn’t compete at all,” Cassidy said. “That was a one-off to me. That’s not us. We’ve been sleepy at times, we don’t always execute, we can get beat. That’s hockey. … But the LA game, we just didn’t compete. Today it was just more of a slower start, but I wouldn’t compare the two, no. … I think we were as rock-solid defensively as we’ve been all year.”
The overall efforts in the two games may not have been comparable, but while the Golden Knights limited Pittsburgh substantially, there were some cases of blown coverage, including on Crosby in the second.
That being said, the Golden Knights’ pushback in the third period was a positive.
“We had a lot of good looks in the third period,” Hanifin said. “Fortunately, we were able to capitalize there at the end, but their goalie made some good saves. But there were chances for us there. … We had a lot of shots on goal but we were missing on some of those grade-A chances.”
The Golden Knights persisted until they found twine to collect a critical point.
“Sometimes it can get frustrating in a game like that where you feel, as a game goes on, you’re starting to control the game more and more, and you’re getting a lot of those opportunities but you can’t find the back of the net,” Hanifin explained. “I thought we did a pretty good job just sticking with it, and obviously we needed until the very last few seconds to get one. It’s tough not getting the two points, but it’s good to come up with one that late in the game.”
Cassidy had a similar takeaway.
“We’ll take the point because when you get it with your goalie out that late, you probably deserved a better fate. But we’ll take it, move on and get ready for Columbus.”
The Golden Knights led 37-17 in shots but fell victim to a fantastic outing by Jarry.
Kaedan Korczak was noticeable throughout, and the Nicolas Roy, Keegan Kolesar and Reilly Smith line was particularly effective. The trio led 18-3 in Corsi, 8-1 in shots and 11-1 in scoring chances with an 82.39 percent expected goal share in 10:13.
The Hertl line (with Dorofeyev and Branson Saad) also performed well, leading 25-5 in Corsi, 14-4 in shots and 12-3 in scoring chances while managing an 89.68 percent expected goal share in 13:07.
The two lines accounted for nine of Vegas’ 11 high-danger chances, with the Roy line recording four and Hertl’s line adding five.
The Golden Knights could use more from Mark Stone and Eichel at 5-on-5, but it’s a good sign for Vegas to find chemistry on other lines, particularly with Saad and Smith finding good fits.
The Golden Knights continue their four-game road swing Thursday against Columbus before taking on the Sabres and Red Wings in a back-to-back on Saturday and Sunday. Karlsson is expected to join the team at some point during the trip.
Statistics courtesy of Natural Stat Trick.