Lehner looks sharp in Golden Knights’ return despite giving up three goals

By Case Keefer (contact)

Tuesday, Aug. 4, 2020 | 2 a.m.

Mark Stone had a full-circle moment as he stepped onto the ice for the Vegas Golden Knights’ first official game of the NHL restart in Edmonton.

At opposite ends of the Rogers Place rink in Edmonton in net were Robin Lehner and Ben Bishop, two goalkeepers who were teammates of Stone in his first NHL minor-league stint with the Binghamton Senators nine years ago.

“I didn’t score too many goals in my first year pro,” Stone laughed as he reminisced about practicing against the pair.

Neither the Dallas Stars’ Bishop nor the Golden Knights’ Lehner have gotten any less stifling over the years, even if Monday’s 5-3 final score in favor of Vegas may indicate otherwise. It might sound harebrained to describe a game with that much offense as a battle of goaltenders, but at its core, that’s a reasonable depiction of the teams’ first of three round-robin games for top playoff seeding.

Lehner came out on top in a showdown between two Vezina Trophy finalists from last year — Tampa Bay’s Andrei Vasilevskiy topped both of them — and was an under-appreciated part of Vegas starting 1-0 in the Western Conference bubble.

The first period was dead even in terms of team efficiency with both sides tallying two high-danger chances, but Bishop allowed a wrister from Chandler Stephenson while Stone stymied everything. A “flat” Golden Knights’ second period, as Stone described it, saw the Stars camping out in their offensive zone and Lehner allowing three goals. The third period was equally dominant in the other direction as Vegas beat Bishop three times of their own for the comeback win.

Emphasis on beat because the Golden Knights’ goals on Bishop were all pure, the exact opposite of the pucks that got past Lehner.

The Stars’ first goal was a direct result of defensive lethargy as Nicholas Roy committed a turnover trying to clear a puck that eventually ricocheted off teammate Alec Martinez’s skate and into the net. Another deflection, on a power play no less, accounted for Dallas’ third goal.

The only score Lehner could have reasonably played better was the second, and that’s a reach as another Vegas defensive lapse allowed Radek Faksa to set a textbook screen right in front of the crease to allow for Jamie Oleksiak’s goal.

“We had no business being up 1-0 at the end of 1; he made some big saves early,” Vegas coach Peter DeBoer said. “He made a couple huge saves at the end. A couple point-blankers that could have tied it up. Timely, big saves for us in order to get two points.”

DeBoer has made analyzing the minutiae of each goaltending performance in the round-robin a priority by not naming his eventual playoff starter between Lehner and Marc-Andre Fleury. The scoreboard might say Lehner took a step back in the competition to earn that spot on Monday — Fleury only allowed one goal in a 4-1 exhibition win over the Coyotes last week — but look a little closer and that’s clearly not the case.

The win over the Stars was a good night for Lehner beyond effectively manning the crease. It also showed his value as a teammate and his standing in the Vegas locker room, an undeniable factor in this race for playing time.

Fleury has been the heart of the Golden Knights for three seasons, the undisputed leader, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if the rest of the roster scoffed at the prospects of a trade-deadline acquisition taking his place. There’s never been any sign of acrimony toward Lehner, however, and the respect from his teammates was as visible as ever in the first game since the coronavirus pause.

Lehner teamed up with another one of the strongest veteran presences on the team, Ryan Reaves, to kneel for American and Canadian national anthems in a call for social justice and human rights. He also vigorously defended the rest of his teammates’ rights to stay standing.

“He’s been a great teammate, always been fun to be around,” said Stone, who’s now teamed up with Lehner on three different occasions. “He’s competitive, one of the more competitive guys I’ve ever played with, and he’s talented. He’s really turned his game around in the last three, four years. I think he takes pride in being a top goalie.”

Lehner has looked the part ever since arriving in Las Vegas, and continued to do so against Dallas. His save percentage was a tad better than Bishop’s — .889 to .875 — in a game that could have gone either way.

Fleury could top Lehner on Thursday against St. Louis, a better offensive team, but that’s far from a guarantee.

Lehner didn’t pull away from Fleury for the right to be Vegas’ starter going forward with the victory by any means. But he didn’t take a step back either.

He outdueled one of the NHL’s best goalies and gave the Golden Knights a better chance to win, which is all a team can ask for out of a netminder in the postseason.

Case Keefer can be reached at 702-948-2790 or [email protected]. Follow Case on Twitter at twitter.com/casekeefer.