I love watching the Vegas Golden Knights. They are one of the best stories in sports the past couple years and should be talked about way more. This is an expansion team and they’ve been much better than the Edmonton Oilers who have been rebuilding for, well, ever.
Maybe we’re seeing future Oilers GM Kelly McCrimmon’s work tonight. It’s incredible the Golden Knights made the Stanley Cup Finals and then they added Max Pacioretty, Paul Stastny, and Mark Stone. That’s arguably a top line and none of those players came from the expansion draft. Okay, they used assets accumulated from the expansion draft, but my point remains.
Vegas’ atmosphere is always fun to see. This is how hockey should be enjoyed. I thought a team in Vegas would be dumb, but they’ve surpassed any expectations I had.
I didn’t expect the Oilers to win this game. Vegas looks seriously good since the Mark Stone trade. Mikko Koskinen had a rough performance and I’m surprised the Oilers didn’t give Anthony Stolarz the start. I guess you want to see how Koskinen performs with a sizeable workload, but, well, early returns aren’t good.
The Oilers weren’t good, but Malcolm Subban didn’t look good tonight and gave the Oilers a small chance at a win tonight. They needed to get more shots on him than they did.

THE BRIGHT SIDE

  • Post! Zack Kassian rings iron early in the first.
  • I’ve liked Ryan Nugent-Hopkins on the first-unit power play all season.
  • Leon Draisaitl scores early in the second. I didn’t even know he scored. Malcolm Subban looked shaky.
  • McDavid gets his eighth straight multi-point game. What a beast. This team can and probably will be a disaster for the foreseeable future but McDavid makes watching them a treat every night.
  • If the Golden Knights can build a good defence and acquire a bunch of scoring wingers in no time, so can the Oilers!
  • Draisaitl scores his 43rd goal of the year. Draisaitl’s gonna get 50. #L50N
  • I thought the Gagner line had some nice shifts. Gagner has 7 points in 15 games and looks like a solid contributor. If Gagner can be a contributor next season that’s another capable guy making okay-isy money. And hey, right shot too!

THE FACE PALMERS

  • Another slow start. This was clearly a team that played last night against a team that didn’t. It took the Oilers five minutes to get a shot on net.
  • The Oilers didn’t have any jump after the Mark Stone goal.
  • Colby Cave took a bad penalty after the Nugent-Hopkins goal.
  • Cody Eakin gets a late goal to put the Golden Knights up 2-1.
  • The Oilers pressured well to start the second, then the Knights get a good chance and Jonathan Marchessault finishes easily past Mikko Koskinen.
  • Is it just me or do the colours seem off on the broadcast? It’s like a faint Instagram filter is on.
  • Koskinen’s glove hand.
  • Through 40 minutes, the Oilers had 13 shots. Yikes.
  • The Oilers had 19 shots total. That’s just abysmal. I know they played the night before but you need to have more pressure than that. Koskinen wasn’t good. At all. But can you really blame it on Koskinen when you only generate 19 shots?

SCORING SUMMARY

1ST PERIOD

TIMETEAMDETAILSSCORE
05:40
VEGAS
MARK STONE (31) ASST: WILLIAM KARLSSON (26)
1-0
13:14
EDMONTON
PPG – RYAN NUGENT-HOPKINS (22) ASST: CONNOR MCDAVID (68), OSCAR KLEFBOM (17)
1-1
19:05
VEGAS
CODY EAKIN (18) ASST: TOMAS NOSEK (9), RYAN CARPENTER (12)
2-1

2ND PERIOD

TIMETEAMDETAILSSCORE
00:22
EDMONTON
LEON DRAISAITL (43) ASST: CONNOR MCDAVID (69)
2-2
02:12
VEGAS
JONATHAN MARCHESSAULT (21) ASST: WILLIAM KARLSSON (27), REILLY SMITH (29)
3-2

3RD PERIOD

TIMETEAMDETAILSSCORE
00:40
VEGAS
JONATHAN MARCHESSAULT (22) ASST: REILLY SMITH (30)
4-2
05:52
EDMONTON
KRIS RUSSELL (3) ASST: SAM GAGNER (3), JUJHAR KHAIRA (15)
4-3
09:45
VEGAS
BRAYDEN MCNABB (4) ASST: SHEA THEODORE (23), RYAN REAVES (10)
5-3
16:32
VEGAS
ALEX TUCH (19)
6-3

#GOODCONTENT