Playoffs Fading: Golden Knights Shutout Again, Lose 4-0 to Jets

The offense for the Vegas Golden Knights (34-28-4, 72 points) was once again non-existent Tuesday night against the Winnipeg Jets (30-24-10, 70 points). The Jets defeated the Golden Knights 4-0 and are now just two points behind the Golden Knights in the hunt for the second Wild Card spot in the West.

This is the fourth time the Golden Knights have been shut out this season and it is the second time that they have been shut out in two-straight games.

Paul Cotter and Daniil Miromanov entered the Golden Knights lineup in place of Brayden Pachal and Jonas Rondbjerg. Logan Thompson made his fourth-straight start and started the second game of a back-to-back.

Similar to their meeting against the Jets one week ago, the VGK had another impressive first period. The Jets’ first shot of the game came at 15:04 into the first period. The Golden Knights led in shots 17-4 after the first period.

By way of the hockey gods, the Jets naturally scored the first goal of the game on just their sixth shot. On the powerplay, Blake Wheeler fed Pierre-Luc Dubois and he scored on a second chance effort on Thompson to make it 1-0. The Golden Knights have allowed the first goal on the road in their last six games.

Roughly two and a half minutes later the Jets scored again. Known Golden Knights killer Kyle Connor fed Evgeny Svechnikov off the rush and he scored. But Peter DeBoer and the Golden Knights bench challenged the play for an offsides, which was deemed to be the case.

The goal came back, and for the first time in a long time, the Golden Knights caught a break.

But this did not stop the Jets from coming back and scoring again, this time with Nikolaj Ehlers scoring on a long-range wrist shot. Tons of bodies were in front of Thompson and he never saw the puck until it was in the back of his net.

In the third period, DeBoer naturally shuffled up his lines and put Chandler Stephenson on the top line with Jack Eichel and Jonathan Marchessault. William Karlsson went back to center and played in between Brett Howden and Nolan Patrick.

Zack Hayes also left the game after he took a stick to the face and had an incredibly bloody nose.

The Golden Knights continued to get shots on Connor Hellebuyck but the urgency and creativity were simply not there. The team put up 42 shots on Hellebuyck but could not find the back of the net once.

They had extended zone time in the third period with a powerplay chance. Marchessault fed Stephenson who just missed a wide-open cage, hitting the crossbar.

Neal Pionk then extended the lead for the Jets burying on a one-timer fed to him by Connor. Nikolaj Ehlers followed soon after scoring on a poke-check type of shot from a centered pass from Scheifele.

The Golden Knights dropped the game 4-0 and have now lost seven straight games on the road.

No takeaways tonight. Instead, we will take a good hard look at what is wrong with this team tomorrow.

VHN’s Player of the Game: Evgenii Dadonov