LAS VEGAS–The Golden Knights have come back to earth after their torrid start to the year, losing their second straight game in a 4-1 decision against the Kings. Including Sunday’s game against the Ducks, the Knights have been outscored 8-3 in their last two outings.
The loss added to the poor fortunes of the Vegas sports world on Wednesday, as UNLV simultaneously got ran out of the gym a mere 2 miles away at the Thomas and Mack Center.
How it happened
The first period went quietly, which was probably a good thing for Vegas sports fans in attendance who were still trying to stomach the UNLV score alerts coming across their social media feeds.
Vegas sports writing legend and The Sporting Tribune’s own Steve Carp remarked about the scene in the press box after the period:
Unfortunately, the bad juju was simply stuck in traffic on it’s way over from Thomas and Mack. It arrived at T-Mobile arena with about 8:30 remaining in the second period, when Adrian Kempe cleaned up a deflection off Knights goalie Adin Hill to put the Kings up 1-0.
Shortly after, a tripping call on Alec Martinez sent the Kings on a power-play. After hanging on for over 1:30, a Trevor Moore slap shot broke through the Knights penalty kill to stretch the Los Angeles lead to 2-0.
The Kings converted another power-play opportunity early in the third period when Pierre-Luc DuBois snuck a deflection off the back wall past Adin Hill to extend the lead to 3-0.
With just over 5:30 remaining in the tilt, the Knights early-season MVP William Karlsson gave the Vegas crowd their only jubilation of the night, scoring his team leading seventh goal with a clean snipe past King’s goalie Cam Talbot.
Anze Kopitar put a bow on the victory for the Kings by scoring his 400th career goal on empty netter as time was winding down.
FINAL SCORE: Kings 4, Golden Knights 1
Next game
The Golden Knights face off against the San Jose Sharks on Friday night. Puck drop is scheduled for 7 p.m. PST at T-Mobile Arena. The Sharks are an NHL worst 1-10-1 and notably lost consecutive games last week by a combined score of 20-3.
