Backlund gets 3 points, Flames defeat Golden Knights

CALGARY -- Mikael Backlund scored twice and had an assist, and the Calgary Flames defeated the Vegas Golden Knights 6-3 at Scotiabank Saddledome on Saturday.

Adam Klapka, Ryan Lomberg, Joel Farabee and Jonathan Huberdeau also scored for the Flames (15-17-4), who have won two in a row and three of their past four. MacKenzie Weegar and Connor Zary each had three assists, and Devin Cooley made 34 saves.

“I thought we had a really good start and then we stuck with it all night,” said Backlund, who also scored twice in Calgary’s 4-2 win against the Seattle Kraken on Thursday. “They pushed back, but we grinded hard and it was a big win for us against a really good team.”

Mark Stone had a goal and an assist, and Reilly Smith and Kaedan Korczak scored for the Golden Knights (16-7-10), who ended their point streak at eight games (6-0-2). Mitch Marner had two assists, and Akira Schmid made 20 saves.

“I think they forechecked us hard,” Vegas defenseman Jeremy Lauzon said. “They wanted it a little bit more than we wanted it. I felt we tried to play a little bit too fancy, especially on the road. That was a game we needed to just play simple and play hard.”

Backlund put the Flames up 1-0 at 3:54 of the first period when he chipped a loose puck past Schmid. Zary made a toe-drag move to get past a sliding Marner and took the first shot that Schmid stopped before Blake Coleman’s follow-up attempt went off the left side of the net and bounced out front to Backlund.

“Some good plays,” Backlund said. “I was just trying to go to the net and put the puck in. Obviously it feels good to score some goals and help the team win.”

Klapka extended the lead to 2-0 at 8:42, getting a piece of Yan Kuznetsov’s long-distance wrist shot as he skated across the crease.

Smith cut the deficit to 2-1 at 10:03. Stone sprung Smith into the offensive zone with a breakout pass, and he went forehand-backhand under Cooley’s glove on a short breakaway.

“Use any positives you can get in your game, so it’s nice to see the puck go in the back of the net,” Smith said. “It would have been nice to help our team get two points tonight, but just keep shooting and hopefully drop some more.”

Lomberg pushed it back to 3-1 at 15:45 when he took a pass from Zary on a 2-on-0 and beat Schmid blocker side with a wrist shot.

“It was nice to see him score,” Calgary coach Ryan Huska said. “I like when he scores at home because the crowd really gets into it.”

Backlund made it 4-1 with his second goal at 8:38 of the second period, backhanding in a loose puck under Schmid at the left post off an initial shot from Weegar. The assist was Weegar’s 200th in the NHL.

Farabee scored a short-handed goal to make it 5-1 at 12:21. He skated into the offensive zone, cut into the slot from the right circle and put a wrist shot in off the far post.

“He’s got good skill,” Huska said of Farabee. “We’ve seen it from him at different times over the course of the year and having patience like he did on that goal was a really high-end goal.”

Weegar started the rush by forcing Marner to turn the puck over in the Flames' defensive zone.

Korczak cut it to 5-2 at 14:34 with a wrist shot from the right circle that beat Cooley through a screen into the top left corner.

Stone brought Vegas to within 5-3 with a power-play goal at 16:03 of the third period. Noah Hanifin's shot bounced off the end boards to Stone at the left post, where he batted it out of the air off Cooley’s back and in.

“In the third period, I thought we sat back and they came on, which you would expect a push from them, but I really liked our overall game tonight,” Huska said.

Huberdeau shot into the empty net at 19:15 for the 6-3 final.

“What you’ve seen out of this team is poor starts and great finishes all year,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said. “As a coach, you’d rather it that way than the other way around, but we need to start better. We need to fix that part.”

NOTES: Farabee scored his third short-handed goal of the season, which is tied for the most among all skaters. … The Flames are tied for the NHL lead with six short-handed goals with the Los Angeles Kings and the Anaheim Ducks. ... Weegar eclipsed the 200-assist milestone (201) and joined Anton Stralman (230) as the second defenseman to hit the mark after being drafted in the seventh round since 2005, when the NHL Draft was standardized to seven rounds. … Stone recorded his 91st multipoint game with Vegas and tied William Karlsson for second-most in franchise history behind Jonathan Marchessault (95).