Golden Knights hold Nashville to 19 shots on goal in shutout win

By Justin Emerson

Saturday, Feb. 1, 2020 | 8:21 p.m.

The Vegas Golden Knights put together a complete performance Saturday night in Nashville, owning the first period and polishing the game off with an empty-netter to finish a 3-0 shutout over the Predators.

Vegas outshot the Predators 39-19, including 14-2 in the first period. The Golden Knights allowed four high-danger scoring chances all game, according to Natural Stat Trick, the fewest of the season.

“I thought we defended hard. We were tight, we got big saves when we needed to,” coach Peter DeBoer told AT&T SportsNet. “That was a game (Nashville goalie Pekka) Rinne wasn’t going to give up much and we needed to have a 1-0, 2-1 mindset and I thought we did that.”

Chandler Stephenson scored in the second period for the Golden Knights and Nicolas Roy scored in the third. Reilly Smith scored against an empty net with 1:02 left, his 21st of the season to tie him with Max Pacioretty for the team lead.

Marc-Andre Fleury picked up his third shutout of the season, but only needed 19 saves to do so, a testament to how much of the game was played in the Nashville zone. The victory was the 459th of Fleury’s career, moving him into tie with Henrik Lundqvist for fifth place on the all-time list.

It was just the second time this season the Golden Knights have won back-to-back games on a road trip.

Here are three takeaways from the win.

Another fast start

The Golden Knights last night outshot the Carolina Hurricanes 16-6 in the first period. Saturday they were even better, firing 14 shots on the Nashville goal and allowing just two.

The first periods are becoming a trend. In five games under DeBoer, the Golden Knights have a 63-41 advantage in first-period shots on goal.

“It seemed like we took off right here we left off last game in Carolina,” Stephenson told AT&T SportsNet. “I think that was the biggest thing, just coming out of the gates hot and staying on it all game.”

Before DeBoer took over as coach three weeks ago, the Golden Knights only held a slight advantage in shots, 546-526, in 49 first periods.

No problems short-handed

Against the Boston Bruins on Jan. 21, Vegas was 5-for-5 on the penalty kill. But DeBoer said killing all those penalties took a toll on his team, leading to the late comeback by Boston.

The Golden Knights tonight once again killed all five penalties, but it didn’t hurt them this time. They even had another late penalty, going short-handed with 3:42 left but killing it off. Vegas has killed 15 of 17 penalties since DeBoer took over as coach.

“I thought they were awesome from start to finish,” Fleury said to AT&T SportsNet. “We had a lot of penalties and the guys did such an amazing job blocking shots and not giving the other team any scoring chances, so I thought that was a big turning point for us.”

Putting away third-period troubles

As strong as the Golden Knights have been early in games, the third period has been a different story. They held leads in their last two games entering Saturday, and allowed the opposition to tie it both times, including coughing up a two-goal lead in Carolina. They won one of those games and lost the other.

And it looked briefly in the third that the same thing might be happening against Nashville. Vegas didn’t allow a goal, but Nashville had its best push of the game in the period, including more than a full minute where the Predators had five consecutive shot attempts. Momentum was moving toward the home bench, which made Roy’s goal with 8:44 left in the third as big as it was.

Justin Emerson can be reached at 702-259-8814 or [email protected]. Follow Justin on Twitter at twitter.com/@j15emerson.