The Vegas Golden Knights (25-14-12) were walloped by the Ottawa Senators (24-21-7) Sunday evening at Canadian Tire Centre, falling by a final score of 7-1.

It was Vegas’ first regulation loss at Canadian Tire Centre after going 6-0-1 in the first seven meetings.

The Golden Knights trailed 7-0 until Rasmus Andersson scored his first as a member of the Golden Knights late in the third period. Otherwise, it would have been the worst loss in franchise history, as Vegas has never lost by seven goals.

Either way, it was all Ottawa all night.

It wasn’t a great start for the Golden Knights, though they had a glorious opportunity when Mitch Marner was awarded an early penalty shot in the first period. However, he tried too many moves and ultimately didn’t get a shot on goal.

The Senators opened the scoring with a shot that came from behind the net off a Vegas turnover. Fabian Zetterlund stripped the puck and then threw it in front from behind the cage, but it went off Kaedan Korczak and then Adin Hill before making its way into the net, giving the Senators the 1-0 lead at 9:25 of the first.

Vegas didn’t allow another shot for the rest of the period.

The Golden Knights had a 5-on-3 at the end of the first that carried over to the second. Vegas had a few decent looks on Senators goaltender Mads Sogaard but failed to take advantage.

Not only did the Golden Knights not tie things up at 1-1, but they gave up two more goals in the span of just 16 seconds six minutes into the middle frame to make it a three-goal contest.

First, Dylan Cozens scored on a nice passing play at 5:51 when Vegas failed to get a clear.

Jordan Spence followed suit at 6:07 when he scored through traffic.

For the second time in three games, the Golden Knights gave up three goals on three consecutive shots, though these were separated by more than 15 minutes. Either way, Ottawa had three goals on its first seven shots of the game.

Hill turned aside the next seven shots, but several Vegas turnovers ultimately led to Stephen Halliday’s second career goal to make it a 4-0 game with 2:10 remaining in the second period.

Through 40 minutes, the Senators were the faster and more efficient team, and for the second time in three games, the Golden Knights trailed 4-0 at the end of two periods.

However, unlike Thursday’s game in Boston, Vegas did not bounce back with an impressive third period. Instead, the Senators scored another three goals in the first four minutes of the final frame.

Cozens scored in transition for his second of the night just 1:22 into the third period following another Vegas turnover, and Halliday added his second of the night on a redirect 43 seconds later. Ottawa completed the touchdown and extra point when Nick Jensen scored from the side boards as the puck changed direction once again before beating Hill.

The three goals came in the span of just 2:34 and put the game even further out of reach just 3:56 into the third period.

The Golden Knights spoiled Sogaard’s shutout bid when Andersson scored his first as a Golden Knight with less than five minutes remaining in the game. Andersson’s 11th of the season came on a strong drive to the net.

But that was the only positive in a disastrous outing for the Golden Knights.

The Golden Knights have lost two out of three games on this four-game road trip, and this one was as bad as it gets. They were a step behind the Senators all night, turned the puck over repeatedly, couldn’t capitalize on chances and failed to stop the bleeding, falling further and further behind.

The Golden Knights were coming off an emotional game against the Maple Leafs, but this was an embarrassing effort.

The Senators have lost eight of their last 11 games and are desperate to climb the standings. However, Vegas faced a team in the second half of a back-to-back and went up against an AHL goalie in his first NHL start of the year.

Vegas had a penalty shot and didn’t even get a shot on goal, and the Golden Knights squandered a 5-on-3 when it was a one-goal game. The Golden Knights also put up just 20 shots on goal and were outshot 26-15 in the second and third periods.

Hill finished the game with a .774 save percentage. He has gone 2-2-0 since returning from injury, giving up a total of 17 goals in four games.

But this was a team loss, as the Golden Knights were completely outplayed in every facet of the game.

“I didn’t like our battle level at all, our compete, our races early on,” Vegas bench boss Bruce Cassidy said. “Typically, the team will have pushback, but we didn’t really have that.”

Seemingly at every turn, things went from bad to worse, and the Golden Knights never exerted their will.

“You gotta get to your game eventually,” Cassidy said. “We’ve had slow starts before. Boston three nights ago, we’re in the same thing at 4-0, but we had pockets of good hockey, and we made it a game. If there were five more minutes left in that game, we might have gotten points. That was never the case tonight. That’s what bothers me. We never made it a game.”

Mark Stone and Jack Eichel saw their point streaks come to an end at 14 and 11 games, respectively. This marked just the fourth time this season that Stone did not find the scoresheet.

“Obviousy, we weren’t ready to go,” Stone said. “[The Senators] got it handed to them the last few. They’re a proud team. They’re gonna come at you hard, and we didn’t really answer.”

But Stone didn’t have an explanation for why Vegas couldn’t stop the bleeding and never found its game.

“Sometimes you get kicked in the teeth, and you gotta get up and get yourself back in the game, and for the most part we usually do that,” Stone said. “But tonight, for whatever reason, we just couldn’t get it going.”

The captain said this type of effort falls well beneath the Golden Knights’ standards.

“It’s two out of three that we’ve done this; in Boston, we found a way to get some energy and get back into the game,” Stone said. “Tonight, it looked like an NHL team against a junior team. It wasn’t what we are. So I’m sure there’s certain things that we’ll probably flush, but you can’t just flush it because you can’t let this be the expectation. It’s not the expectation for our team. We’ve been through some heavy playoff runs, we’ve been through a lot of adversity, and we never roll over and die. So we’re gonna have to learn from it and be ready to go for Tuesday night.”

The Golden Knights have delivered two of their best performances of the season in emotional games against Toronto, but they need to be able to tap into that energy more frequently, which Stone discussed after the game.

“The emotion we had on Friday night going back into Toronto, we gotta find that,” Stone said. “We can’t just rely on Mitch’s return to Toronto to get yourself into the game. We were ready to go, we were inspired to play, and for whatever reason tonight, a slow start, and the same in Boston. Just not on your toes early. We made the game a lot harder than it needed to be.”

Cassidy said the Golden Knights should have built on the strong win in Toronto, if anything.

He said the team would practice tomorrow and would learn from the loss but that it was up to the individual players to be prepared, especially for games that start earlier in the day.

“What is it, late January?” Cassidy asked. “Is this a practice thing where we gotta go over stuff, or is this showing the hell up on time?”

Vegas will have to be significantly better on Tuesday when they take on Montreal to wrap up this four-game road trip. The Golden Knights have six games remaining before the Olympic break.

Photo via Golden Knights