Vegas Golden Knights fail to bring their “A” game to the Big Apple

The expansion Vegas Golden Knights had high hopes when they set sail for New York five days ago.  At that time, there were a lot of folks talking about how lucky they had been at home, and wondering if their luck would run out when they hit the road.  Only, there were other whispers in Vegas and beyond, that this team is actually good.

So what happened when the Golden Knights rolled into New York? Did their luck run out or did they just struggle on the road, without their home crowd behind them?

Perhaps, the truth was told in a tweet, which proclaimed, “We need to play three periods.” – @VegasGoldenKnights

Prior to arriving in New York to face the Islanders, the Vegas Golden Knights had won five in a row.  The Islanders beat the Knights by a score of 6-3.  The next day they lost to the New York Rangers by a score of 6-4, in a game where the Golden Knights played hard for the first two periods.  Reilly Smith scored two goals.  Only many say the defense seemed to falter especially in the third period, and the New York Rangers took advantage of the vulnerabilities. Sin City’s offense seemed to disappear in the third period, as well.

With just four shots in the third, they were practically invisible on the ice.  What happened?  The team made mistakes, and they were costly mistakes at that.

You cannot win if you give the puck away, and that’s pretty much what happened.  The Golden Knights gave the puck away more than ten times, and when you give the puck away in your own zone, it’s not good!

Keeping in mind that the team had just experienced horrific events at home when a horrible tragedy happened at the Harvest 91 music festival on October 1, and terrible events happened in New York City, on the day the team was here in New York City, it’s safe to say that there’s a chance that this team has undergone so much during the past month, and a lot of it has nothing to do with hockey.  What remains evident about this team is it’s ability to connect to one another, not blame others (including the refs) and bond together and move on.

While New York fans, of both the Islanders and the Rangers are likely glad that the Vegas Golden Knights might have had their luck run out when they arrived in New York, folks in Vegas are uniting around their team and even those with New York roots are rooting for them.

Thursday, the Vegas Knights will face the Boston Bruins, and it’s highly likely you’ll have many New Yorkers cheering #GoKnightsGo.  It’s fun to watch a new team take flight, and while the Vegas Golden Knights might not have brought their ‘A’ game to New York, they did show up and managed to score, and made it interesting.

It’s a long season, and we can look forward to more fun on the ice from this new team who has a whole lot of energy and might just get lucky, or prove to everyone they have the capacity to be very good!!