Golden Knights collapse in third period to fall 6-4 to Rangers

By Jesse Granger

Published Tuesday, Oct. 31, 2017 | 5:51 p.m.

Updated Tuesday, Oct. 31, 2017 | 8 p.m.

The Golden Knights suffered another third period collapse Tuesday night, but this time without the late-game magic.

New York scored four unanswered goals in the third period to beat the Golden Knights 6-4 at Madison Square Garden.

Vegas entered the final 20 minutes with a 4-2 lead, but were out shot 11-4 in the final period.

Maxime Lagace surrendered five of the goals (the sixth was added on an empty net in the game’s final minutes) but he didn’t receive much help from the defense in front of him.

After giving up only 19 goals in the first nine games of the season, the Golden Knights have now given up 12 goals in the last two.

Mika Zibanijad assisted on the Rangers’ fourth goal with a great pass that allowed Pavel Buchnevich to tap it past Lagace> Zibanijad then scored a goal of his own less than five minutes later to give the Rangers a 5-4 lead.

Reilly Smith led the Golden Knights with his third and fourth goals of the season. Oscar Lindberg scored in the first period and David Perron capitalized on the first penalty shot in team history for a goal that put the Golden Knights up 4-2 at the time.

The loss brings the Golden Knights’ record to 8-3 on the season and they head to Boston to play the Bruins on Thursday.

Golden Knights lead 4-2 after second period

David Perron scored on the first penalty shot in Golden Knights history to extend the Golden Knights lead to 4-2 over the second period in the second period.

Perron deked New York Rangers’ goalie Henrik Lundqvist then put the puck under his pads to extend the Golden Knights lead to two.

Earlier in the period Reilly Smith scored his second goal of the game, and fourth of the season, to give the Golden Knights the lead back after Jimmy Vesely tied the game 2-2.

In his first career start, Lagace stopped 25 of 26 shots faced including two great saves during a second period penalty kill.

Golden Knights lead 2-1 after first period

In his first return to Madison Square Garden since being taken from the New York Rangers in June’s expansion draft, it didn’t take long for Golden Knights forward Oscar Lindberg to make his presence felt.

Lindberg scored a goal to tie the game 1-1 after Alex Tuch weaved his way through the Rangers’ defense and shot the pad off Henrik Lundqvist’s pads. Lindberg found the rebound and scored against his former team.

Later, Reilly Smith found a rebound in front of the net and put it past Lundqvist to give the Golden Knights a 2-1 lead, which they took into the intermission.

Golden Knights’ goalie Maxime Lagace, who was making the first start of his NHL career, saved eight of the nine shots he faced in the first period.

Pre game

On Monday morning, 19-year-old rookie goaltender Dylan Ferguson was in Kamloops, British Columbia, as a member of the Blazers junior hockey team. Monday night, he was on a flight to New York City, where he will serve as the Golden Knights backup goalie in today’s game against the Rangers at Madison Square Garden.

Ferguson is one in a long line of inexperienced goalies who have been thrown into the fire for the Golden Knights this season, which is only 10 games old. When Marc-Andre Fleury went down with a concussion, Vegas called on Malcolm Subban, who had two career NHL games at the time. When Subban went down, it was Oscar Dansk who entered the game without a single game of NHL experience. Monday night, Maxime Lagace was in the same situation when he filled in for an injured Dansk, and tonight, the Golden Knights are hoping Ferguson doesn’t have to fill in for Lagace.

The run of injuries at the goaltender position has been brutal, but the Golden Knights are still 8-2-0 despite it.

Opposite of Lagace today will be Henrik Lundqvist, who has appeared in 879 career NHL games. The veteran goaltender has helped lead the Rangers to the Eastern Conference Finals and Stanley Cup Finals, but he has struggled to start this season.

Lundqvist is 2-4-2 and has allowed 26 goals in those games. But he’s not solely to blame for the Rangers’ slow start. New York is 19th with only 2.8 goals per game, and key offensive producers Mats Zuccarello, Rick Nash and J.T. Miller have combined for only six goals.

If the Golden Knights can give Lagace more help than they did down the stretch of their 6-3 loss to the Islanders, they should have a chance today. However, with the disparity in goaltending experience, the Rangers are rightfully a sizeable favorite at minus-230.

Puck drops: 4 p.m.

Where: Madison Square Garden, New York City

Radio: Fox Sports 1340 AM and 98.9 FM

TV: AT&T SportsNet (DirecTV 684, Cox 1313, CenturyLink Prism 1760, Dish Network 5414)

Betting line: Golden Knights plus-215, Total 5.5 minus-120 to the over

Golden Knights (8-2-0) (2-1-0 away)

Coach: Gerard Gallant

Goal leader: James Neal (7)

Assist leader: Brad Hunt (7)

Expected goalie: Maxime Lagace (0-1-0, 9.60 goals against average)

New York Islanders (3-7-2) (3-4-2 home)

Coach: Alain Vigneault

Goal leader: Mika Zibanejad (7)

Assist leader: J.T. Miller (8)

Expected goalie: Henrik Lundqvist (2-4-2, 3.11 goals against average)

Golden Knights game day roster

Forwards (12): Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, William Carrier, Cody Eakin, Erik Haula, William Karlsson, Oscar Lindberg, Jonathan Marchessault, James Neal, Tomas Nosek, David Perron, Reilly Smith and Alex Tuch.

Defensemen (6): Deryk Engelland, Jon Merrill, Colin Miller, Luca Sbisa, Nate Schmidt and Shea Theodore.

Goalies (2): Maxime Lagace and Dylan Ferguson

Prediction : New York Rangers 5, Golden Knights 3

Season record for predictions: 4-5