LAS VEGAS — If you watched the Vegas Golden Knights and Toronto Maple Leafs Thursday night, you saw three games in one.
There were the Leafs dominating in the first period, looking to run Vegas out of its own rink with a 3-0 lead. There was the Golden Knights’ rally to tie it, highlighted by a successful penalty shot
by Jack Eichel in the second period that tied the game 3-3.
And then there was the remainder of the match, which saw both goaltenders come up big for their respective teams and ultimately, the Knights prevailing in a shootout thanks to youngsters Braeden Bowman and Trevor Connelly, the latter who notched the game-winner in the fifth round to give Vegas the 4-3 win.
“I liked that we picked each other up,” Knights coach Ryan Craig said. “I like that we stayed with it, both individually and as a team. There’s something to be said for how we stuck together.”
Craig, who had coached both Bowman and Connelly in the AHL with Henderson, knew they were capable of producing in a shootout. That Sergei Bobrovsky had not seen either shooter before probably helped too as each beat the veteran netminder for the Knights’ only successful shootout tallies.
“It was awesome,” Connelly said of getting the deciding goal after Bobrovsky had robbed him in the second period with a glove save at the right doorstep. “I’ve been trying to get better each day and feel more comfortable. The guys have been so supportive.”
Ivan Barbashev said Connelly has done his part to fit in.
“He’s a very skilled player, very confident in his abilities,” Barbashev said. “He works hard every day and he’s earned everybody’s respect.”
Thursday also saw Mitch Marner and his linemates William Karlsson and Brett Howden find the scoresheet and maybe it gets them going offensively.
The Golden Knights’ second line has just three points total and only one goal through four games. That was Marner against Vancouver last Saturday. Defensively, they’ve been good. But with Victor Olofsson, Vegas’ leading goal scorer with four tallies out week-to-week with a lower body injury, it means someone needs to help fill the void.
So why not Marner, Howden and Karlsson?
Playing the Maple Leafs always brings out a little extra push from Marner, who wore the blue and white for his first nine seasons in the NHL before being traded to Vegas in 2025. And with the Knights trying to rally from the 3-0 first-period deficit, the line connected for the second goal of the night, Karlsson to Marner who made a perfect diagonal feed to Howden at the left doorstep and he beat Bobrovsky to cut it to 3-2. It was Howden’s first goal of the season.
“I think we’ve been playing well,” Marner said. “Our line has been doing a lot of good things. We haven’t been rewarded for it.
“I like the way we’ve been playing. We’re hunting pucks. We’re getting pucks back. We’re just missing that last play. We just have to make sure we can make that last play and put the puck in the net.”
The Knights’ top line of Eichel, Barbashev and Mark Stone continued their strong play with Stone getting Vegas on the board in the first period with a slap shot from the high slot that cleanly beat Bobrovsky and Eichel’s penalty shot in the second period after he was hauled down coming in alone.
It got Adin Hill off the hook temporarily after he struggled early on. He gave up a soft goal to Jack Roslovic just 34 seconds into the match, failing to cover the short side. He then was beaten by Easton Cowan on a breakaway and shortly after, by Nick Paul, who tipped home Darren Raddysh’s blast from the blue line as Toronto was up 3-0 and looking to run the Knights out of their own building.
But Hill would settle down and he made three big saves in the second period, including a stop of Roslovic in close when the Leafs forward was all alone at the left doorstep late in the period.
He was flawless in overtime and allowed only Kirill Marchenko to beat him in the shootout. Hill got the best of Auston Matthews, William Nylander, rookie Gavin McKenna and finally, John Tavares, to get the win after Connelly scored in the fifth round.
“I think the guys picked Hilly up and he responded,” Craig said of his goaltender, who is 2-0 this year. “As our team got better, Hilly got better. He made some big saves in the second period as we were pushing and allowed us to get to overtime, and then the shootout.”
The Knights made some history Thursday, though not the kind they wanted or expected. For the first time in their 10-year existence, they failed to sell out a regular season home game, not counting the Covid pandemic season in 2020-21. Just 15,977 were on hand as there were large swaths of empty seats throughout T-Mobile Arena.
Capacity is 17,367 and with a high-profile opponent as Toronto in town, it’s a bit if a mystery as to why so many fans opted not to attend.
But for those who showed up and stuck around, they saw a heck of a game. Make that three games in one.
