One of the rules to winning a best-of-seven playoff series is to never miss an opportunity. When in position to win a game – win it. The Vegas Golden Knights did that on Monday night.
Vegas led for much of Game 1 and when they needed to push back and snatch a 3-1 win, they did and now hold a 1-0 lead over the Anaheim Ducks in this second round series.
Anaheim, according to VGK head coach John Tortorella, was the better team on the night. They had more shots and scoring chances and zone time.
“They were the better team tonight. As the game went on, we started finding our game, but we couldn't find it completely. It's a find-a-way league and we found a way,” said Tortorella. “I'm certainly not going to apologize for it, but we have to be honest with ourselves, and I believe we will have a better game coming up.”
Vegas goalie Carter Hart was the best player on the ice and kept the opposition off the scoreboard except for a third period goal from Mikael Granlund.
Vegas took a 1-0 lead on a second period goal from Brett Howden before Granlund tied it up in the third period. Ivan Barbashev put Vegas back in front just over a minute later and Mitch Marner added a third goal for the Golden Knights with an empty net marker.
It's a race to four wins and wasting an elite goaltending performance from Hart would have been damaging to Vegas. Instead, they were opportunistic and scored more goals than Anaheim which, of course, is the only path to victory.
The Ducks were an offensive juggernaut in their first round series win over the Edmonton Oilers, going 8-for-16 on the power play.
Vegas was perfect on the penalty kill Monday snuffing out four Anaheim man-advantage situations.
Timely scoring, fantastic goaltending, and an impenetrable penalty kill were the keys to the Golden Knights win.
Tortorella and his coaching staff will have some notes for the players on Tuesday leading up to Game 2 scheduled for Wednesday.
The coach is right in his statement about not apologizing for winning on a night when his group didn’t play its best. But that’s the challenge now: to ramp up and be better on Wednesday.
Notes:
Marner continues to be a clutch playoff performer for Vegas and now has three goals and nine points in seven games. Marner has assisted on the last three goals scored by Brett Howden and four of his winger’s five goals in this postseason.
“He sees everyone and everything on the ice and he makes plays that no one else is capable of,” said Howden. “It’s been a lot of fun playing with him and my job is to get to the net and be ready.”
Howden has done just that and has been critical to Vegas beating Utah in Round 1 and taking a series lead over Anaheim.
Barbashev now has three goals and four assists and a point in every VGK game these playoffs.
Monday’s win gave Vegas its 67th playoff victory since it joined the NHL in 2017-18 which is the most in the league. The Golden Knights were tied with Tampa at 66 wins over that span coming into Monday’s action.
