Vegas Golden Knights center Paul Cotter (43) stands on the ice during an NHL hockey game against the Arizona Coyotes at T-Mobile Arena Thursday, Nov. 17, 2022.
Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2022 | 2 a.m.
Golden Knights 2022
Paul Cotter knew at some point he would be coming out of the lineup.
It wasn’t that the Vegas Golden Knights forward lost his confidence — he just hit the proverbial rookie wall.
After a preseason in which he played in all seven games, as well as the first four to start the regular season, Cotter was scratched for the first time following the Oct. 18 game in Calgary, a 3-2 loss.
Cotter played 9 minutes, 53 seconds that night and took just four shifts in the third period.
“I don’t want to say my game dropped off, but I didn’t get too much more ice time, and I just didn’t really create much,” Cotter said.
That Calgary game had all the makings of a statement game for the 23-year-old. He played on a line with Jonathan Marchessault and William Karlsson, seemingly a perfect fit for his strong skating and scoring ability.
But that line generated just two shots on goal and allowed eight against the Flames.
Cotter spent the next 10 games as a healthy scratch, watching the games from the press box, high above the ice.
Rookies never want to watch games from up top. Coaches don’t want it, either, to avoid hindering the player’s development. Cotter tried to make the most of it.
“When you’re looking up there, you can see you have more time than you think,” Cotter said. “It’s cool watching the older guys do their thing and you pick up a few things, especially from watching from a calmer perspective, rather than on the bench.”
A normal situation would have Cotter going back into the lineup after two, maybe three games. But there was one problem: The Golden Knights kept winning.
Cotter sat for almost the entirety of the Golden Knights’ nine-game winning streak that began Oct. 24. Veteran forward Michael Amadio replaced him in the lineup.
Choosing not to fix what wasn’t broken, Cotter watched winning hockey and saw the Golden Knights climb to the top of the Western Conference standings heading into Thanksgiving week.
Coach Bruce Cassidy put Cotter back in the lineup Nov. 10 against Buffalo on the third line with Phil Kessel and Brett Howden.
On a night best remembered for Jack Eichel scoring a hat trick against his former team, Cotter had the first multipoint game of his career with a goal and an assist in the 7-4 win, Vegas’ ninth in a row. “I thought there were areas of his game where he could’ve been harder against a bigger team, and that’s what we want Paul to be,” Cassidy said. “He wasn’t training camp physical when he needed to be stronger on pucks, when he needed to finish on a few plays.”
Cassidy ultimately wants his third line to be the shutdown unit, playing strong defensively while chipping in when needed on offense. Given the personnel, that’s not likely.
Kessel, 35, has never been a strong defensive player and Cotter has room to grow in his overall game. The best defensive player on that line is Howden, but he doesn’t have the lockdown capability of Karlsson or Nicolas Roy.
The third line will remain a work in progress for Cassidy, and Cotter has earned the right to be part of that solution.
“It happens with younger players. I think I’ve done a pretty good job,” said Cotter, who has four points in nine games. “I’m not too far down in rookie points in 10 less games. That’s a bonus for me, but I think it also shows I’m playing well, playing hard. I’ve just got to keep it up.”
Pietrangelo’s hot start
Alex Pietrangelo is quietly having a start that has put him among the league’s best defensemen.
Pietrangelo recorded his third 3-point game in less than two weeks on Monday in a 5-4 win over Vancouver. His 20 points through 20 games has the veteran defenseman tied for third among defensemen in scoring, and his 17 assists are tied for second-most among those at the blue line.
“(The pucks) are just finding my stick,” Pietrangelo said. “Sometimes you just kind of get lucky. Sometimes you go through spells where you get nothing, sometimes you just get the bounces.”
Goal scoring, however, has come at a premium so far. Pietrangelo, who has eclipsed double-digit goals seven times in his career, scored his third of the year — the game-winner — against the Canucks and has two goals in three games.
But the lack of scoring seems to be by design.
“We’ve asked him to be a little less, I don’t want to say conservative … but more under control in the neutral zone, not be as aggressive trying to kill plays,” Cassidy said. “There’s been days we’ve had to remind him because Petro likes to use his instincts. We don’t want to take that away from him. I thought he’s bought into it very well.”
Top line among the league’s best
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that the Golden Knights’ record-setting start has been due to the play of their top line.
The trio of Eichel, Chandler Stephenson and Mark Stone are second in the NHL in expected goal percentage, better known as the percent of all expected goals the team gets when that line is on the ice.
Vegas’ top line has generated 68% expected goals, trailing only the New Jersey Devils’ top line of Tomas Tatar, Nico Hischier and Fabian Zetterlund, according to analytics website MoneyPuck.
Headed into Monday night’s game at Vancouver, Eichel led the Golden Knights with 22 points and 10 goals, with Stephenson at 18 points in 19 games. Stone was closing in on a point-per-game pace after scoring twice in the 4-3 overtime loss Saturday in Edmonton.
Upcoming schedule
• 7 p.m. Wednesday vs. Ottawa — TNT (Cox 18, DirecTV 245)
• 5 p.m. Friday vs. Seattle — AT&T SportsNet-Rocky Mountain (Cox 313, DirecTV 684)
• 7 p.m. Saturday vs. Vancouver — AT&T SportsNet-Rocky Mountain (Cox 313, DirecTV 684)
• 4 p.m. Monday at Columbus — AT&T SportsNet-Rocky Mountain (Cox 313, DirecTV 684)
