Saturday, Jan. 25, 2025 | 2 a.m.
For the final five minutes of the second period, the Dallas Stars dominated the Vegas Golden Knights.
The Stars put seven shots on goal, scored twice and had the Golden Knights crawling out of exhaustion to get off the ice. When the dust had settled at the end of the night, the second period proved to be the difference.
Vegas lost Dallas, 4-3, which included the Golden Knights scrambling for a goal in the final two minutes of the game. Pavel Dorofeyev nearly had the game-tying goal but was robbed by Stars goalie Jake Oettinger, who made a highlight reel glove save.
But Vegas wouldn’t have been into an all-or-nothing position if it hadn’t slipped in the final minutes of the prior period.
“We just got outcompeted in front of our net,” Eichel said. “We had a couple of long shifts on our end, and they were able to capitalize … It was just that middle period that didn’t go our way and ended up costing us.”
Golden Knights coach Bruce Cassidy has been harping on a similar theme throughout the entire month: Vegas is taking itself out of games and having to battle its way back.
Vegas and Dallas kept pace with each other until the final fourth of the second period. Eichel scored in the first period on the power play to put Vegas up 1-0 before Dallas responded with a power play goal of its own.
The early second period was another goal trade-off. Jake Robertson scored, and then Shea Theodore responded to the power play for a 2-2 tie.
Down 4-2 in the third period, Eichel scored again in the final 10 minutes of the game, but Vegas couldn’t find the tying goal. Mark Stone had three assists, Eichel had two goals and Tomas Hertl extended his point streak to 12 in eight games.
“You’ve got to get through those bad stretches without taking yourself out of the game,” Cassidy said. We weren’t out of the game at 4-2, but it felt like they (Stars) were feeling good about themselves, and we needed to avoid that.”
The constant struggles have been on Eichel’s mind, and he’s been vocal about them. Cassidy said after the second period Eichel was “very vocal” and “not happy” about the way things had gone.
After the game, he emphasized that the Golden Knights had talked enough about the issues at hand and needed to start thinking about how to fix them.
Vegas has lost seven of its last nine games, going 5-6-1 over January and has not won back-to-back games since Jan. 7. This is coming off a December where Vegas went 10-2-0.
Vegas’ effort to turn things around does not get easier as it hosts the defending Stanley Cup Champion Florida Panthers on Sunday at 5 p.m.
“We’ve done enough talking about it,” Eichel said. “It’s been a few weeks now that we’ve been struggling. It’s just a commitment to competing, doing the right things and the will to win.
“We know we have it in here. It’s just about grasping it and doing it.”