After stalling offensively during a disappointing 1-3-2 homestand, the Vegas Golden Knights will try to regain momentum while playing five of their next six games on the road.
Their journey will begin Saturday night when they visit the St. Louis Blues.
After scoring 14 goals in their last six games, the Golden Knights are looking to get their offense back on track.
The solution, winger Reilly Smith said, is “just putting puck into the paint and trying to find rebounds and dirty goals. That’s what we’re going to have to do for this next little bit to get out of this scoring slump we’re in. Goals aren’t coming easily, especially far away from the net.
“So you just have to grind your way kind of through and find opportunities in the paint.”
The Golden Knights also are seeking better starts. In the finale of their homestand Thursday, they fell behind the New York Islanders before rallying in an eventual 4-3 overtime loss.
“To end the first period down 2-0 is tough,” Smith said. “I think we are the better team. Sometimes that’s just how it happens. It seems like it’s happening to us a lot lately. So it’s hard to come back and win. We’re putting ourselves in that position pretty often right now. So we’ve got to figure that out.”
Penalties also were an issue against the Islanders.
“It’s not like us to take five penalties, so hopefully that’s something that we’ll (be) cleaner on our one-on-ones and do a better job,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said.
The Blues, meanwhile, will play the second game of back-to-back home outings. On Friday night, St. Louis squandered 3-1 and 5-3 leads before dropping a 6-5 decision in a shootout to the Philadelphia Flyers.
“Making repetitive mistakes that you lost games with early is frustrating,” Blues coach Jim Montgomery said.
Said St. Louis center Robert Thomas: “We’ve got to close out games. We come out in the third, grab two goals, there should be no chance of letting them back in. We’ve got to clean that up.”
The Blues have just three wins in their last 13 games (3-6-4), and have suffered three overtime or shootout losses in their last eight contests. Their five-goal outburst against the Flyers was their best offensive performance since Oct. 13, when they won 5-2 in Vancouver.
“We score five goals, you’ve got to win that game. There’s got to be more desperation in us,” Montgomery said.
The Blues broke down in two areas: protecting the front of the net against deflection and rebound goals, and protecting the slot from opponents moving into that prime shooting area.
“Defending harder, we’ve got to take care of the puck better,” Thomas said. “They shouldn’t have a guy coming down the slot shooting. That’s can’t happen anymore, especially when you’re up two in the third (period).”
Because the Blues started Jordan Binnington in goal on Friday, they might come back with Joel Hofer on Saturday.
