Tomas Nosek was out of red no-contact and participating fully. He may play tomorrow night. Luca Sbisa and Jon Merrill were back at practice, though wearing red no-contact jerseys. They're "both really close," according to Gerard Gallant.
Afterwards, Gallant updated us on Malcolm Subban's status, calling him week-to-week. He named Marc-Andre Fleury as the starter tomorrow night, which is an unusually early admission from a coach who normally publicizes his starter on gameday.
We saw the bottom-six reshuffled, as Alex Tuch rejoined Cody Eakin (with Oscar Lindberg), while Brendan Leipsic might skate with Pierre-Édouard Bellemare (with Nosek and/or Ryan Carpenter).
Finally, these guys showed up again, after taking in last night's tilt:
After a long road trip, the Golden Knights received a rude homecoming from the Flyers, as Philadelphia took a 4-1 decision at T-Mobile Arena.
Winning Play
With about three minutes left in the middle frame, it looked like just a matter of time before Vegas would break a 1-1 deadlock. Up to this point in the period, the Knights held a decisive 14-4 advantage in shots.
But then, Travis Konecny, one of the few Flyers with constant jump in his game last night, eluded both James Neal and Erik Haula, then forced Nate Schmidt and Brayden McNabb back on their heels.
While Bellemare admitted "it was a bad play from me," I look at it a different way.
From the beginning, Gallant has wanted all his players to be aggressive, creative, and smart. This Bellemare misfire was in that spirit. To no surprise, Gallant did not upbraid Bellemare after his mistake. Not every coach would be so understanding.
"I didn't hear anything from him except next time I need to be more selfish," Bellemare noted. "He's been a coach that tries to help us be more creative. [Better to lose] by being aggressive than being somebody else."
Bellemare did assert, "The play yesterday had nothing to do with that though. It's an easy hockey play." But I'm going to disagree somewhat.
When you're aggressive, mistakes will happen. This mishap was in that spirit -- Bellemare was thinking aggressively, creatively, and intelligently (in theory, what's more dangerous, getting the goalie moving on a 2-on-0 give-and-go or a 1-on-0 bid?).
If you want to stay aggressive, you have to take the good and the bad. And the Golden Knights' record suggests that their overall aggressiveness has added up to a lot more good than bad.
Part of the Knights' aggressiveness is an emphasis on everybody playing fast, from first line to last. And playing fast isn't just skating fast.
(That's a forward drop pass from Eakin, another drop pass from Lindberg, another drop pass from Leipsic, to Colin Miller)
This quick puck movement mesmerized Philadelphia for most of the game, though Vegas lacked finish.
Minuses
Despite keeping the Flyers from any shooting area, high-danger or otherwise, for most of the game, individual defensive mistakes doomed the Golden Knights. This tied the game at one apiece:
Sean Couturier bothers the Deryk Engelland clear, Reilly Smith is slow to switch on Couturier rolling to the net, and Shea Theodore doesn't make a strong attempt to block the two-on-one pass from Konecny.
Later, Claude Giroux scored a 3-1 dagger with just six seconds left in the second period. It appears that Giroux snuck behind Bellemare to tap it in.
There was a four-man rush and Pierre-Édouard Bellemare picked up the right guy. He was looking at the right guy and then Giroux jumped over his shoulder. It wasn’t Bellemare’s fault.
He was looking at [Gostisbehere] coming from the end. That goal was created from the other end. It wasn’t Bellemare’s mistake. We didn’t get the backcheck on the guy.
I don't fully agree.
While indeed, as with most goals against, the play started on the other end, chiefly a Vegas offensive zone turnover, Neal and David Perron getting caught deep, and a wide-open lane for Couturier to sail through, Bellemare is telling Neal to pick up Gostisbehere when he points his stick. That's the switch, as Giroux has blown past Neal.
Bellemare took it on himself, "[Giroux] put out the toe of his stick, and it's a goal. I'm right there, but I don't have my stick on the ice. A weak play. That can't happen."
The normally-reliable defensive center went further, when he spoke about how the Giroux-Couturier-Konecny line dominated the contest.
"It's a good line," Bellemare conceded. "But we gave them those goals. Some weak plays in the blue paint."
"Blue paint" was the choice phrase after the game, as Gallant and every Knight noted that while they piled on the shots, they weren't from the dirty areas. Per Natural Stat Trick, Vegas only held a 6-5 5v5 High-danger Corsi For edge, despite a 62-32 Corsi For rout.
The Golden Knights will look to improve on this when they host the Blackhawks tomorrow night.
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