When you go to Las Vegas you either get lucky or unlucky. For the Washington Capitals, a 4-1 loss to the Vegas Golden Knights is about as unlucky as it gets. They also say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas so let’s hope this bad effort by the Caps stays there.
Jonathan Marchessault put the Golden Knights up 1-0 at 8:53 of the first period on the power play. In the second period, Jack Eichel doubled their lead at 7:56. 49 seconds into the final period Mark Stone made it 3-0 for Vegas.
At 16:46 the Caps finally got on the board with a goal from Tom Wilson, his fourth goal in two games after a hat trick the other night and his eighth of the season which ties Dylan Strome for the team lead. Strome and John Carlson had the assists.
Marchessault added his second goal of the game on an empty net at 18:03 to cap off the scoring and give the Golden Knights the win. Vegas had the edge in shots in the first two periods 10-5 and 18-4, respectively.
The Caps had the edge in shots 13-8 in the third period while Vegas had the edge in shots overall 36-22.
Darcy Kuemper got the start in goal and made 32 saves in the loss. Charlie Lindgren was unavailable due to body maintenance. As a result, the Caps had to recall Hunter Shepard from the Hershey Bears, who had to rush from Charlotte, North Carolina to Las Vegas.
Shepard found out the same way we all find out big news, by waking up from a nap in his hotel room.
The Capitals five game road trip concludes on Monday night at the Arizona Coyotes. They will practice around 2 p.m. eastern today from Mullett Arena. Tomorrow night they drop the puck at 9 p.m. and while it’s another late night we’ll take a 9:00 start any day after this week that we had.