The Vegas Golden Knights suffered their third straight loss in a 2-1 overtime defeat against the Columbus Blue Jackets Saturday night at Nationwide Arena.<\/p>\n
Adam Fantilli scored on the power play 59 seconds into extra time to secure the win and extra point for Columbus.<\/p>\n
Mitch Marner missed his second straight game as he awaits the birth of his child. Alexander Holtz was back in the lineup for Marner, and Braeden Bowman got bumped up to the third line.<\/p>\n
For the eighth time this season, the Golden Knights surrendered the first goal. They are now 3-4-1 when doing so (compared to 5-0-0 when scoring first).<\/p>\n
With the loss, Vegas moves to 8-4-1 on the year.<\/p>\n
Puck management was an issue once more for the Golden Knights, and it ended up biting them when Columbus opened the scoring 11:51 into the contest.<\/p>\n
Rasmus Andersson gathered the puck off a Columbus dump-in and tried to clear it up the boards but ended up turning the puck over, and the Blue Jackets took full advantage. Denton Mateychuk beat Vegas to the net and took a great feed from Kent Johnson before besting Carter Hart on a forehand-backhand deke.<\/p>\n
But the Golden Knights were able to reset the score 5:22 later.<\/p>\n
Trevor Connelly had himself a game, and he continues to establish himself as a talented and dependable rookie for the Golden Knights. Though he was noticeable throughout the contest, his most impactful play was an excellent pass that ultimately led to Tomas Hertl\u2019s fifth of the year on the rebound.<\/p>\n
Cam Talbot made a brilliant save to turn aside Bowman\u2019s initial attempt, but Hertl was there to finish the full-line play to even things up at 1-1 with under three minutes to go in the opening frame.<\/p>\n
The two clubs were tied at 1-1 through 20 minutes.<\/p>\n
The second period was a rough one for Vegas even though neither team scored.<\/p>\n
Columbus led 18-10 in Corsi, 8-5 in shots, 4-1 in high-danger chances and came away with 74.39 percent of the expected goal share, per Natural Stat Trick.<\/p>\n
Hart made a particularly fantastic save to rob Sean Monahan, preventing the home team from capitalizing on an \u201coff\u201d period for Vegas.<\/p>\n
The third was a much better effort by the Golden Knights, and part of it had to do with head coach Ryan Craig shuffling the lines, including putting Connelly up with Jack Eichel and Mark Stone. That line was Vegas\u2019 best of the night, but Talbot shut down their most promising opportunity.<\/p>\n
After the game, Craig said he made the changes because he was \u201clooking for some energy. I thought Trevor had energy all night, so I moved him up with [Eichel and Stone]. I shuffled around [Brett Howden] and [Ivan Barbashev] there, moved some guys and tried to create a little more energy. We were a little stagnant in the second.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though the moves helped, the two clubs were unable to decide a winner through regulation, setting up extra time.<\/p>\n
However, Shea Theodore took a holding penalty 15 seconds in, setting up a critical moment for Vegas\u2019 penalty kill, which had already come up with two huge kills in the third period.<\/p>\n
But the penalty kill was unable to go 3-for-3, as Fantilli\u2019s one-timed blast beat Hart for the game-winner.<\/p>\n
The loss wrapped up an awful two-game road trip for the Golden Knights, who are now losers of three straight games including Tuesday\u2019s 6-2 home loss to Tampa Bay as well as Thursday\u2019s 6-2 loss to St. Louis and tonight\u2019s 2-1 overtime loss to Columbus.<\/p>\n
This was a much tighter game after four straight 6-2 contests, but many of the same issues reared their head once again.<\/p>\n
Special teams continue to be an issue.<\/p>\n
For one thing, Vegas extended its streak of giving up a power-play goal to five consecutive games. It didn\u2019t happen until after regulation in a 4-on-3 situation, but it cost Vegas the game and the extra point. There\u2019s no way around the fact that the penalty kill has to be much better.<\/p>\n
The Golden Knights got their first power play in two games in the first period, but they didn\u2019t do much with it. Theodore was at the point in place of Marner, but it was another unsuccessful opportunity.<\/p>\n
Not only does the power play need to be more effective and productive, but Vegas has to work harder to draw more penalties. One power play in 121 minutes of hockey is not going to get it done, particularly for a struglgling man-advantage that can\u2019t improve without more reps.<\/p>\n
Hart had a solid game, as he and Talbot battled in a low-scoring affair. Hart finished the night with 18 saves on 20 shots for a .900 save percentage but made some key stops throughout.<\/p>\n
The Blue Jackets were desperate for a win, but the Golden Knights needed to match that desperation. They did not.<\/p>\n
At the end of the day, a point is a point, but failing to collect the second one against one of the worst teams in the league isn\u2019t good enough for a team with Vegas\u2019 aspirations.<\/p>\n
The defense was better but still sloppy, especially on Columbus\u2019 first goal, though Craig was pleased with his team\u2019s effort.<\/p>\n
\u201cOverall, we defended very well,\u201d Craig said, pointing to the fact that the puck hit the camera hole on the first goal (which can\u2019t be challenged), while the second was a 4-on-3 power-play tally. He said the team needs to take the positives and keep looking forward.<\/p>\n
That being said, the offense has completely dried up. One way or another, the Golden Knights have to find a way to score more goals.<\/p>\n
Not having Marner makes Vegas less dynamic, but once Craig put Connelly on the top line, the Golden Knights looked like a team without any offensive depth.<\/p>\n
That adjusted top line was by far Vegas\u2019 best of the night, leading 15-5 in shot attempts and 8-1 in shots in 6:40. Outside of that line, though, Vegas didn\u2019t have much going. Something has to give.<\/p>\n
But Craig remained positive after the loss.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re gonna build on that [third period] and the positives,\u201d he said. \u201cYou get a point and you climb and you keep going; that\u2019s how this league works. Continue to work to get your game fixed, make adjustments as you go with personnel or how you play or what you\u2019re trying to do. But for me, what I like is we got better as the game went on. We continued to push.\u201d<\/p>\n
But with three straight losses, the Golden Knights are in a bit of a slump. It happens, and it\u2019s nothing they can\u2019t fix, but they need to do whatever it takes to break the cycle as soon as possible, starting with Tuesday\u2019s home tilt against the Senators. The following matchup will be against Connor Hellebuyck and the New Jersey Devils on Friday.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a mindset that you\u2019re gonna continue to push and grow,\u201d Craig said. \u201cWe have a really mature group here in the sense of they take responsibility, they look at themselves and what they can improve, what can they continue, what can they build on. And we need to do the same as a coaching staff as we continue to work together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Statistics courtesy of Natural Stat Trick.<\/p>\n
Featured image via @BlueJacketsNHL on X<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Vegas Golden Knights suffered their third straight loss in a 2-1 overtime defeat against the Columbus Blue…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":694796,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5129],"tags":[149,5317,5,4,74,39,5316],"class_list":["post-694795","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-vegas-golden-knights","tag-golden-knights","tag-goldenknights","tag-hockey","tag-nhl","tag-vegas","tag-vegas-golden-knights","tag-vegasgoldenknights"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/117499472340744738","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694795","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=694795"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/694795\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/694796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=694795"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=694795"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=694795"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}