Knights top Panthers to open Final

After his team took a 1-0 lead in the Stanley Cup Final with a 5-2 victory on Saturday night, Vegas center Jonathan Marchessault stressed the importance of staying even-keeled heading into Monday’s Game 2 in Las Vegas.

“I think we know the importance of each game,” said Marchessault, who scored his eighth goal in the last eight games. “Obviously, the first game was huge to get the win. We can be satisfied until midnight but after that we have to focus on Game 2.”

Marchessault speaks from experience.

The Golden Knights also won Game 1 in 2018 in their only other trip to the finals. But the Alex Ovechkin-led Washington Capitals rebounded to win the next four games in a row to get their names engraved on hockey’s most cherished trophy.

Adin Hill made 33 saves and Zach Whitecloud scored the go-ahead goal to highlight a three-goal third period for Vegas in Saturday’s opener of the best of-seven series. Shea Theodore had a goal and an assist, Jack Eichel had two assists and Marchessault, Mark Stone and Reilly Smith also scored for Vegas.

Eric Staal scored a short-handed goal and Anthony Duclair also scored for Florida, which had an eight-game road winning streak snapped. Sergei Bobrovsky stopped 29 of 33 shots.

Staal said there was no panic in the Florida locker room after dropping Game 1. After all, the

Panthers also lost the opener in their first-round series with Boston and came back from a 3-1 deficit to stun the Presidents’ Trophy winners in seven games.

“It’s part of this time of year,” Staal said. “That’s how it works. You get yourself off the mat and be excited for the challenge of Game 2.”

“It’s the first game,” Bobrovsky added. “It’s a long series. Lots of hockey ahead of us. We play, we learn, and we move on.”

The game was tied 2-2 entering the third period when Whitecloud fired a long wrist shot through traffic from inside the blue line past the glove of a screened Bobrovsky at the 6:59 mark.

Stone made it 4-2 with 6:19 remaining when he knocked down a clearing pass in the slot and then roofed a shot into the top right corner of the net for his seventh goal of the playoffs. Smith added an empty-netter to seal the win. (Reuters)