Golden Knights at Devils
The Vegas Golden Knights hit the road for a five-game trek beginning with their first encounter against the New Jersey Devils on Sunday after coming up snake eyes in consecutive home contests for the first time in its inaugural season. Vegas, which has seen its lead in the Pacific Division shrink to eight points, will try to avoid the first four-game losing streak in club history after falling to Ottawa 5-4 on Friday at T-Mobile Arena and in a home-and-home series with Los Angeles.
"I think our game’s just slipping a bit. We have to get back to the basics,” Golden Knights defenseman Shea Theodore told reporters Friday after Vegas fell to 24-7-2 at home. “The playoff race coming down the stretch is going to be tight for points and we have to play a lot better hockey.” New Jersey leads the Eastern Conference wild card race by five points despite losing its last two games, including 3-1 at Carolina on Friday. Taylor Hall has scored in three straight contests and recorded at least one point in all 24 games he's played since the calendar flipped to 2018, totaling 17 goals and 34 points during that span. "We need a lot more guys going," Devils coach John Hynes told reporters. "The last two games, we've been outplayed. We don't have enough guys committed enough and as detailed enough for us to have success, so we got what we deserved both (Thursday) and (Friday)."
TV: 5 p.m. ET, AT&T SportsNet Rocky Mountain (Las Vegas), MSG Plus (New Jersey)
ABOUT THE GOLDEN KNIGHTS (41-18-5): Reilly Smith (22 goals, 60 assists), the NHL's Third Star for February, has 10 goals and 14 assists in his last 16 games after recording one of each Friday. William Karlsson (Western Conference-leading 35 goals, 59 points) has scored in two straight games and owns five goals in his last five contests. James Neal (24 goals) and defenseman Nate Schmidt did not play Friday because of undisclosed injuries and are listed as day-to-day.
ABOUT THE DEVILS (33-24-8): Hall has 70 points, becoming the first New Jersey player to reach that plateau since Ilya Kovalchuk (83 points) and Patrik Elias (78) in 2011-12. Nico Hischier (13 goals, 41 points), the first overall pick in the 2017 draft, is mired in a six-game goal drought since scoring in four straight contests. Cory Schneider (17-12-6, 2.79 goals-against average, .913 save percentage) is expected to start in goal after making 26 saves in Thursday's 3-2 loss at Florida - his first game since missing 16 with a groin injury.
OVERTIME
1. The Devils have scored a power-play goal in three consecutive games while not allowing one in their last seven contests (15 chances).
2. Vegas scored first in all three games during its losing streak, falling to 26-5-1 when netting the first goal.
3. New Jersey has lost five straight versus the Western Conference and is 11-9-3 in such games this season, including 5-4-2 against the Pacific. Vegas is 14-9-3 versus the East and 6-5-1 against the Metropolitan.