It took two overtime periods and a disallowed goal, but the Golden Knights have been defeated for the first time. They gave up just 3 goals in the whole of the first round, but gave up 3 goals in the 2nd period last night, and the Sharks added a 4th in the 2nd overtime period. The Knights appeared to have won the game in the first overtime, but the goal was overturned due to goaltender interference.
Watching the Golden Knights is completely mystifying. Where did they come from? How did they get so good? Certainly everybody knew Marc-Andre Fleury was a star. And the Knights were able to acquire some quality defencemen in the expansion draft. But at forward, James Neal and David Perron were the only guys on their roster that had any credentials as scorers. Eric Haula has been around the league for years, and never scored much, but had 29 goals this year. Marchessault and Reilly had some success with the Florida Panthers, but I guess nobody noticed because they were with the Panthers. This year Marchessault had 75 points. Who had even heard of him before this year? William Karlsson had 3 goals, 9 goals, 6 goals in his previous 3 seasons... this year, 43 goals. That's insane! The people who scouted all these guys for the Knights in the expansion draft did an amazing job of finding all these gems.
-k