Golden Knights conquer Canucks
LAS VEGAS — Jonathan Marchessault had a goal and two assists and the Las Vegas Golden Knights beat the Vancouver Canucks 6-3 on Tuesday night.
The defending Stanley Cup champions have won three straight and six of seven since a 6-10-1 slide that dropped them into the second slot in the wildcard race.
The victory inched Vegas (92 points) closer to secondplace Edmonton (95) in the Pacific Division. The Canucks sit atop the division.
Anthony Mantha, Jack Eichel, Noah Hanifin, William Karlsson and Brett Howden also scored for Vegas, while Logan Thompson stopped 27 shots to win his sixth straight start in his 99th career game.
Quinn Hughes scored twice and Nils Hoglander added one goal for the Canucks. Casey DeSmith made 24 saves.
Mantha started the five-goal first period when he grabbed a loose puck DeSmith slid from beneath his pads and into the crease and deposited it into a wide-open net.
Marchessault made it 2-0 when he took a backhand crossice pass from Ivan Barbashev, carried it across the blue line, and fired it past DeSmith for his team-high 41st goal.
Moments after Hoglander punched home a loose puck near the crease and cut Vegas’ lead in half, Eichel was positioned perfectly in the slot to onetime Marchessault’s pass from beneath the goal line.
Hanifan pushed the lead to three goals when his blast from the centre of the blue line gave Vegas its first power-play goal in five games.
With a game misconduct on Vancouver’s Nikita Zadorov carrying over into the second period, the Golden Knights didn’t waste any time taking advantage of the extra skater. Alex Pietrangelo’s initial attempt at the doorstep was stymied by DeSmith, but Karlsson was there to give Vegas a 5-1 lead.
Hughes’ power-play stroke between the top of the circles cut the deficit to three goals. His second goal came less than two minutes into the third period to cut Vegas’ lead to two.
Vegas answered 24 seconds later when Howden tapped home Keegan Kolesar’s feed during a two-on-one break.
The Canucks now head to Phoenix to take on the Arizona Coyotes tonight.
Canadiens 5, Panthers 3
MONTREAL — Nick Suzuki scored the tying and go-ahead goals in the second period and Sam Montembeault made 37 saves in leading the Montreal Canadiens to a 5-3 victory over the Florida Panthers on Tuesday night.
Cole Caufield, Jake Evans and Joel Armia also scored while Alex Newhook had two assists for Montreal, which won its fourth in five games.
Aleksander Barkov, Sam Bennett and Anton Lundell tallied for Florida, which lost to Montreal for the first time in four meetings (3-1-0) this season. Anthony Stolarz made 34 saves.
The feisty game featured 66 minutes in penalties.
The playoff-bound Panthers have struggled with losses in eight of their last 10 games.