*Photo from ABC7*
That Vegas magic is already making an impact. William Karlsson had a goal and an assist, Mark Stone scored the game winning goal, and the Vegas Golden Knights defeated the Los Angeles Kings with a 4-3 victory on Tuesday night in Los Angeles.
Looking to wash off the stench of a disappointing 2021-2022 season, the Golden Knights got it started the right way, winning new head coach Bruce Cassidy's first game behind the bench. Besides the two point game from Karlsson, Chandler Stephenson and Alex Pietrangelo each had two assist games.
Cassidy said after the game that "I think, for a coach, you're always worried that when you don't know your team that well, it's our first game, what will happen when things don't go well? It's always to me a sign of good character in the room when a team's resilient, so that's a big plus for me no matter how the score turned out."
The only goal of the first period came from Gabe Vilardi, who gave the Kings a 1-0 lead 10:36 into the game, assisted by Quinton Byfield and Alex Iafallo. Early in the second period, Jonathan Marchessault tied the game 1-1, scoring just 1:41 into the middle frame, with Karlsson picking up the lone assist.
Vegas struck early in the 3rd period as well, with Jack Eichel scoring 1:27 into the period to make it 2-1. Sean Durzi and Anze Kopitar assisted on Adrian Kempe's game tying goal at the 4:02 mark of the 3rd, before Karlsson scored a power play goal to make it 3-2. Arthur Kaliyev scored to tie the game 3-3, and Stone put Vegas ahead with a goal with 26 seconds on the clock.
After the game, Stone said that "We had our breakdowns, but that’s just learning curves. If we can cut those in half, we’ll get it done. Power play got a little talking-to in between periods there. We stepped up for it in the third."
Getting the opening night start for Vegas was youngster Logan Thompson. He picked up the win in his first start of the year, improving to 1-0-0 with 27 saves on 30 shots faced, recording a .900 save percentage.
Starting opposite Thompson for the Kings was Jonathan Quick. In his first start of the year, Quick faced a high shot volume, saving 47 out of the 51 shots he faced, dropping to 0-1-1 with a .922 save percentage in the loss.
Kings head coach Todd McClellan said of the game that "At times when we were connected, we were fast. Other times disconnected, the passing was off, timing was off. Forwards wanted the puck, defensemen held on. Forwards needed to get the puck, or the defensemen needed to get the puck up, forwards weren't available. So, work to do."
Up next, Vegas gets back in action on Thursday with a home game against the Chicago Blackhawks, with Thompson the likely starter. The Kings host the Seattle Kraken on Thursday, with Quick the probable starter.
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