Vegas a win away from title showdown
Smith scores late breakaway goal to guide Golden Knights to narrow victory over Jets in Game 4
>> LAS VEGAS: The Vegas Golden Knights were a 500-to-1 long shot to win the Stanley Cup before the NHL season began in October. Their surprisingly successful inaugural season is still rolling along, and they’re one win from a berth to the Stanley Cup final.
Reilly Smith scored on a breakaway late in the third period to lead Vegas to a 3-2 victory over the Winnipeg Jets in Game Four of the Western Conference final on Friday night.
Vegas can clinch the conference title and advance to the Stanley Cup final when the series resumes today in Winnipeg.
“The last one is always the toughest to get,” Golden Knights goalie MarcAndre Fleury said.
William Karlsson and Tomas Nosek also scored for Vegas, and Fleury, ninth all-time in postseason wins, turned in another spectacular performance by making 36 saves to earn his 73rd career play-off victory.
The 14-year veteran goalie, left exposed by the Pittsburgh Penguins for Vegas to select him in the expansion draft, continues to have a careerbest postseason as he aims for a third straight Stanley Cup title.
“I think we’ve got to keep the same mindset,” said Fleury, who has a 1.72 goals against average and .945 save percentage in the play-offs. “Just take it one game at time and not think too far ahead and be ready to play that next game, because they’re going to be coming hard.”
It’s something the Jets have already been doing, even in their three losses in the series.
Asked how his team have been able to survive Winnipeg’s tenacious attack, Smith replied: “He’s sitting right next to me,” referring to Fleury at the postgame news conference.
But with the game tied at two, it was Smith who made the big play after racing down the left side of the rink and beating Winnipeg’s Connor Hellebuyck above his blocker to put the Golden Knights ahead with 6:58 minutes left.
Hellebuyck made 27 saves, but lost for the third consecutive game despite telling reporters after Game Three that he liked his game better than Fleury’s. Patrik Laine and Tyler Myers scored for Winnipeg, which is on the brink of elimination.
“I know we can win a game, we’re a good enough team,” Winnipeg coach Paul Maurice said. “We’ve battled. We’ve gone into some pretty heavy environments and won a game that we needed to win. So it’s just one game.”
The Jets took over where they left off in the third period of Game Three by outskating the Golden Knights in the first period of Game Four, but Karlsson’s power-play goal was the difference.
Off the draw, Smith found Jonathan Marchessault, who fed Karlsson for the one-timer that gave Vegas a 1-0 lead.
In a case of deja vu from Game Three, when Vegas responded 12 seconds after giving up a 1-0 lead, Winnipeg and the Golden Knights traded goals 43 seconds apart midway through the second period.
First, it was Laine’s one-timer on the power play that even Fleury wasn’t catching up to and it tied the game at the 9:29-minute mark.
Then, it was Hellebuyck failing to secure a shot by Pierre-Edouard Bellemare, who raced to the puck and fed Nosek, who punched in his first career play-off goal to put Vegas up 2-1.
“It’s a good way to be, when they get one, the next guy’s up and ready to go,” said Golden Knights forward James Neal, who is looking to make it to the Stanley Cup final for a second consecutive year after getting there with Nashville last season.