It was a sight Vegas Golden Knights fans were looking forward to for months. Now, we’ll see if it’s a positive sign of things to come.
Jack Eichel notched his first goal as a member of the team that moves heaven and earth to get the players it wants, as Vegas downed San Jose 4-1 on Sunday night. The goal demonstrated why Vegas pulled off another in a seemingly endless series of huge transactions for this still-fledgling franchise to get Eichel, as the six-foot-two centre twirled around the perimeter of the Sharks zone during a bout of 4-on-4 play, hit Chandler Stephenson with a great pass, then broke toward the net and converted a sweet return feed from his new teammate.
Eichel — acquired from Buffalo in early November — has three games with Vegas under his belt now after returning from artificial disc replacement surgery in his neck. His first point with the Knights came earlier in the weekend, when he registered an assist in an overtime loss to a Los Angeles Kings squad that’s scrapping tooth-and-nail with Vegas for playoff positioning in the Pacific Division.
I’m not sure you’d find too many people before the season who thought L.A. and Vegas would be in the same standings stratosphere, but here we are. And even if that has a lot to do with a surprisingly strong season by the Kings and a debilitating run of injuries for the Knights — Max Pacioretty, Mark Stone (insert IR joke here) and William Karlsson have all missed an appreciable amount of time — there’s no denying the Knights have been a little flat. Since Christmastime, they’re 9-7-4.
For a while, it seemed like their average play may not stand in the way of a Pacific title. But with division-leading Calgary ripping off 10 straight wins, second-place Vegas is suddenly four points back of a squad that holds two games in hand on them. Missing the playoffs completely would seem like a stretch, but Vegas has only a five-point cushion on the outside-looking-in Anaheim Ducks.
Really, no matter what went on in Vegas, we never expected to be talking about this club in the same breath as plucky playoff hopefuls. This team has kept elite company from its very first strides, skipping the baby-steps stage and going right into full contender mode. From its debut season in 2017-18 through the 2020-21 campaign, no Western Conference club has more wins than the Knights. This year, though, four West teams are ahead of Vegas in terms of points percentage, and if you look at the goal differential of those outfits, the worst among them is St. Louis, at plus-38. Vegas, meanwhile, is living in a more modest neighborhood at plus-19.
There’s been an undeniable gap between Vegas — firmly mediocre in terms of advanced numbers — and the cream of the Western crop. Some of that comes down to key injuries, but there’s also been underwhelming play from Robin Lehner in his first year as the unquestioned No. 1 and special-teams play that sees the penalty-killing ranked 16th in the league, while the power play lags behind, at 20th.
There’s certainly an argument to be made that nothing much matters for Vegas until the post-season because this a Cup-or-bust team. But given their uneven play and the fact they’re now trying to integrate what should be their best-ever offensive weapon in Eichel, this squad bears watching down the stretch to see whether or not it can find a new gear before the games become really important.
Other Takeaways
• Speaking of the Sharks, it seems as though San Jose has fully crashed back to earth after a very promising first half. The loss to Vegas marked the team’s sixth straight loss and the Fins have just two wins in 12 tries since mid-January. The Nashville Predators — who lost 5-3 in Carolina on Saturday — are also skidding. The Preds have dropped four straight games and suddenly find themselves in a dog fight for one of the final Western Conference playoff spots. The Predators have allowed at least four goals in all four of those defeats, so tightening up defensively would be a great place to start in terms of hitting the breaks on this slide.
• Hat tip to the weekend hat tricks, as Tage Thompson and Mason Marchment both registered the first three-goal games of their young careers. Thompson actually buried three on Saturday versus Colorado and added another for good measure the next day in Columbus. While both those games were losses for the Sabres, Thompson’s stellar play of late — he’s scored eight goals in his past 10 games — bodes well for the re-building squad. Marchment, meanwhile, has formed a wonderful connection with Anton Lundell on the Florida Panthers’ third line, giving that team overwhelming scoring depth. His three-goal game came Friday night in Minnesota and the 26-year-old late-bloomer now has 27 points in 25 games with the Panthers this season.
• I don’t know how you say congratulations in Finnish, but I’m sure it’s a long, amazing word. Why do I get the sense the disparaging comments about Finland’s defensive style from former IIHF president René Fasel will do absolutely nothing to dampen the (still-going?) party in that awesome country after the Lions defeated Russia to win Olympic gold for the first time in their history?
Weekend Warrior
On 2/22/22, we celebrate Adrian Kempe, who had two two-goal games on the weekend. Kempe netted the overtime winner on Friday versus the Golden Knights and tied the Kings’ game with the Coyotes on Saturday just 12 seconds after Arizona opened the scoring. Kempe’s 23 goals give him nine more than the next-closest Kings (Anze Kopitar, Phillip Danault and Alex Iafallo all have 14) and his 23-10 stat line in 47 games makes him a solid Cy Young candidate with less than a third of the season to go.
Red and White Power Rankings
1. Calgary Flames (30-13-6): Make it 10 straight for the Flames after the Calgarians downed Winnipeg 3-1 on Family Day. Elias Lindholm — he of the eight-game goal-scoring streak — has 22 goals this season and 14 of them came either during this current hot run or in the first four games of the year, when he scored a half-dozen times.
2. Toronto Maple Leafs (32-14-3): Eleven goals against in two weekend games for the Leafs is more than enough to stoke the always-simmering defensive questions about this club. Did we mention the trade deadline is a month away?
3. Edmonton Oilers (28-19-3): Sunday’s 7-3 setback to the Wild marked the first loss of the Jay Woodcroft era. Things will only get tougher from here as the Oilers kick off a five-game roadie on Wednesday that starts with games in Tampa, Florida and Carolina.
4. Winnipeg Jets (22-20-8): It was definitely a long weekend for the Jets, who absorbed two losses — one in Calgary, one at home versus Edmonton — and now sit seven points back of the second wild card in the West.
5. Vancouver Canucks (24-22-6): J.T. Miller has got to be the most intriguing “will they/won’t they?” trade candidate ahead of the deadline. Miller had two more assists during Monday night’s 5-2 win over Seattle, giving him 53 points in 50 games this year.
6. Ottawa Senators (18-26-5): Two losses for Ottawa on the weekend, but Tim Stützle scored in both defeats and has three goals in his past four games to find a little offensive life.
7. Montreal Canadiens (11-33-7): How did the Habs, who beat the Islanders 3-2 in a shootout on Sunday, celebrate their first two game-winning streak of the year (for real)? By putting up five on their blue and white rivals the next night and extending that two into a three. Montreal is now an even 3-3-0 under new bench boss Marty St. Louis.
The Week Ahead
• Corey Perry is having a wonderful season with the two-time defending-champion Lightning. The 2011 Hart Trophy winner can net his 400th goal when the Bolts host the Oilers on Wednesday.
• If Perry doesn’t get goal No. 400 before next weekend, maybe he can net it on the big stage outside as Tampa visits the Predators on Saturday night at Nissan Stadium, home of the NFL’s Tennessee Titans.