Golden Knights Gameday

Golden Knights Gameday 41: Jack’s Back: Lines and Notes vs Penguins

Reinforcements are inbound as the Vegas Golden Knights (26-12-2, 54 points) start a seven-game homestand tonight against the Pittsburgh Penguins (19-12-6, 44 points). Forwards…

Published

1 year ago

January 5, 2023

Owen Krepps

Reinforcements are inbound as the Vegas Golden Knights (26-12-2, 54 points) start a seven-game homestand tonight against the Pittsburgh Penguins (19-12-6, 44 points). Forwards Jack Eichel and Paul Cotter are expected to return from injury for the Golden Knights, which gets the team's injury list down to seven players. Eichel missed eleven games with a lower-body injury, and Cotter eight with an upper-body injury.

This is the final game of the season series between the Penguins and Golden Knights. The Penguins won in Pittsburgh on Dec. 1st, 4-3.

The Penguins, who are coming off a Winter Classic loss to the Boston Bruins, are 1-4-2 in their last seven games. They are without both their top defensemen, Kris Letang, and starting goaltender Tristan Jarry. The Golden Knights are 3-6-0 all-time against the Penguins.

The Golden Knights will be hosting Pride Knight at the Fortress tonight. Special Pride jerseys will be worn by the team during warmups and will be auctioned off during the game on the Golden Knights Foundation's Website.

What to Watch For

Welcome Additions

Both Eichel and Cotter rejoin a depleted Golden Knights lineup who are in desperate need of scoring depth. Head coach Bruce Cassidy has shuffled up his line combinations in preparation for tonight's game by forming a new first line. Eichel will likely play with Reilly Smith and Nicolas Roy on the top line.

This allows the line of Michael Amadio, Chandler Stephenson, and Mark Stone to stay together. Stone is currently riding an eight-game point streak, and Amadio has a seven-game point streak.

Ending Droughts

Several players on the Golden Knights have ended goal-scoring droughts recently. Given injuries and the team's overall lack of depth, this has been crucial to the team's recent success. Ben Hutton ended a 29-game goal drought, Brayden McNabb a 45-game drought, Keegan Kolesar 19 games, Nicolas Hague 25 games, and Nicolas Roy most recently scored two goals to end a 17-game drought.

Vegas Born

Penguins forward Jason Zucker grew up in the Las Vegas area and will face off against his hometown team for the fifth time in his career tonight. He has three goals and three assists for six points against the VGK.

Projected Vegas Golden Knights Line Combinations

Reilly Smith- Jack Eichel- Nicolas Roy

Michael Amadio- Chandler Stephenson- Mark Stone (c)

Paul Cotter- William Karlsson- Phil Kessel

Will Carrier- Jake Leschyshyn- Keegan Kolesar

Nicolas Hague- Alex Pietrangelo

Brayden McNabb- Kaedan Korczak

Ben Hutton- Brayden Pachal

Logan Thompson/Adin Hill

Golden Knights Special Teams

PP1: Stephenson, Stone, Smith, Eichel, Pietrangelo

PP2: Cotter, Karlsson, Kessel, Roy, Hutton

PK1: Karlsson, Smith, McNabb, Pietrangelo

PK2: Stephenson, Stone, Hague, Hutton

IR/Scratches

Shea Weber, Nolan Patrick, Robin Lehner/Jonathan Marchessault, Brett Howden, Pavel Dorofeyev, Shea Theodore, Zach Whitecloud, Alec Martinez, Daniil Miromanov