The Vegas Golden Knights overcame the Calgary Flames and a rave-induced ice delay to improve to 2-0 with their new coach.
It was also a banner night for Mitch Marner.
The Knights’ star winger recorded his first hat trick with the team to help defeat the Flames 6-3 at T-Mobile Arena on Thursday.
Marner added two assists for a season-high five points, as the Knights (34-26-16) have back-to-back wins under new coach John Tortorella.
Winger Brett Howden gave the Knights a 4-3 lead with 7:41 remaining, and Ivan Barbashev added an insurance tally with 5:01 to go.
Marner completed the hat trick on a wrap around with 1:29 left.
Pavel Dorofeyev added his team-leading 35th goal of the season.
Goaltender Carter Hart made 19 saves in his return after missing nearly three months with a lower-body injury.
All of that happened along with a lengthy 25-minute delay because of ice issues before the start of the third period.
The Knights’ TV broadcast reported that the zamboni potentially scraped the ice and created a hole on the City of Las Vegas decal on the visitor’s side of the rink.
Ice crew members tended to the ice with fire extinguishers while smoothing out the ice, which erased a noticeable part of the V in “Vegas.”
All this happened while the Knights’ intermission nightclub playlist was playing in the background.
Play resumed at 9:32 p.m., and the use of the fire extinguishers was symbolic because the Knights doused the Flames in the third.
Calgary’s first three goals each came off a 2-on-1 off a Knights turnover.
Kaedan Korczak’s turnover near the defensive blue line allowed Calgary center Morgan Frost plenty of time to shoot and beat Hart at 7:41 of the first for a 1-0 lead.
Flames winger Blake Coleman’s two goals also came off odd-man rushes — once after Dorofeyev lost sight of the puck, scoring at 4:38, then again off a bad pinch by Rasmus Andersson at 12:11.
Both offset Marner’s two goals, which gave him his second multi-goal game against the Flames this season. He tied it 1-1 at 1:47 after deflecting Shea Theodore’s shot, then tied at 6:42 off a feed from Andersson in front of the net. Dorofeyev scored with 3:39 left in the period on a one-time power-play goal to tie it 3-3.
Former Knights defenseman Zach Whitecloud played 24:38 in his first game against his former team. Whitecloud was traded to Calgary on Jan. 18 for Andersson.
The Knights went 2-0-2 on their four-game homestand. Now, they begin a four-game road trip Saturday against the Edmonton Oilers in a pivotal Pacific Division clash.
Contact Danny Webster at dwebster@reviewjournal.com. Follow @DannyWebster21 on X.