Pachal Scores First Career Goal: Golden Knights defeat Sharks 4-1

The Vegas Golden Knights defeated the San Jose Sharks 4-1 in the Sharks’ home opener.

It was the Sharks’ opening night. A good effort was expected. The Golden Knights did a great job with their transition game on Tuesday against the Seattle Kraken. The Sharks did a good job of slowing down the Golden Knights through the neutral zone for the game’s first two periods.

The Sharks had a good effort for the game’s first 37 minutes. The Golden Knights remained patient and scored three goals within less than four minutes of each other.

The Golden Knights and Sharks did not waste time acclimating themselves with one another. Kyle Burroughs leveled Michael Amadio with a clean check and had to answer the bell. Kolesar wasted no time dropping the gloves with Burroughs.

Amadio opened the scoring late in the first period. Karlsson did a great job carrying the puck behind the Shark’s net and found Amadio. Mark Stone lost a puck battle that created a scoring chance that led to a Sharks goal with just over two minutes remaining in the first period. Tomas Hertl had a puck deflect off of him directly to Filip Zadina. Zadina beat Logan Thompson low blocker side to make it a 1-1 game heading to intermission.

The teams traded chances for most of the second period and it seemed the teams would enter the third period tied. Nicolas Hague beat Kaapo Kahkonen with an 89 mph one-timer to make it 2-1. Nicolas Roy would score on a breakaway less than a minute later to give the Golden Knights a 3-1 victory heading into the third period.

Braden Pachael opened the scoring in the third period with his first NHL goal. Pavel Dorofeyev found Pachal at the top of the right circle who used a screen by Amadio to find the back of the net.

Alex Pietrangelo took a puck high off the visor that cut him open above his eye. It was a good sign that Pietrangelo was able to immediately get up and skate off the ice under his own power. The Golden Knights are currently without defensemen Zach Whitecloud and Alec Martinez. Kaedan Korczak would be the next man up if Pietrangelo is unable to play in the next game.

Logan Thompson was sharp in his first game action in nearly seven months. Thompson stopped 22 of 23 shots. This was the first game Thompson finished dating back to late January of last season.

Next up for the Golden Knights are the Anaheim Ducks on Saturday night at T-Mobile Arena.