The Vegas Golden Knights weren’t about to let a shutout defeat on Wednesday snowball into something much larger.
The Golden Knights found their game earlier and finished the season sweep of the Ottawa Senators with a 3-2 victory at Canadian Tire Centre on Thursday.
“We all knew we didn’t play our best,” Golden Knights forward Ivan Barbashev said. “We’ve been struggling for a while, especially the first 20 minutes. It hasn’t been good enough. We talked about it today, and we got out there, and it was a little better. “
Here are some takeaways from the game:
Bouncing Back
The Golden Knights came out with energy to start the game, which was vital given they were on the second game of a back-to-back.
Jack Eichel scored the first goal at 6:45 of the first period, which helped the Golden Knights settle into the game and not play catch up.
“I thought we controlled the tempo of the game the first half,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said. “I thought that was important for us not to have to chase the game. To me, that’s the biggest thing when you’re on a road trip and you’re playing a lot of hockey — try not to put yourself in a position to chase the game so that you can use your whole bench and guys can feel good about their games. That’s what happened.”
Samsonov Saves the Day
Ilya Samsonov made 38 saves in the victory, including 16 in the third period. His stop on David Perron’s wrist shot late in the third period kept the game in Vegas’ favor.
“He was huge,” Golden Knights forward Brett Howden said. “He made some big saves, especially towards the end there. They had a few plays where they could’ve been putting one or two of them in. Big saves from him. It was a big night.”
No. 400 for Golden Knights coach
Cassidy earned his 400th career victory against the Senators. He has 108 victories with Vegas, 245 with Boston, and 47 with Washington over the course of 11 seasons behind the bench.
“It feels great,” Cassidy said. “You never know where your number is going to end up. But I’m going to tell you: In this business, I’m just worried about No. 401 right now.”
Paul Delos Santos is the Las Vegas sports insider for Dice City Sports. Follow him on X at @PaulDelos_.
