Despite facing a 3-1 hole in their best-of-seven Western Conference second-round series, the Vegas Golden Knights aren’t lacking confidence heading into Wednesday night’s Game 5 against the Edmonton Oilers in Las Vegas.
“We did it last series,” Vegas forward Reilly Smith said of winning three straight games. “We have a lot of faith in this group. Just take it one at a time.”
The Golden Knights did rally from a 2-1 deficit to knock off the Minnesota Wild in six games in the first round, winning two of the final three games in overtime.
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The difference this time is that there’s no room for error against an Edmonton team that is 15-2 in Games 4-7 over the past two playoffs.
“It’s do or die now,” Knights star centre Jack Eichel said.
The Oilers won Games 1 and 2 in Las Vegas before the Golden Knights rallied for a 4-3 victory at Edmonton, winning on a Smith goal with 0.4 seconds left.
The Oilers bounced back from that bitter loss to blank Vegas 3-0 in Game 4 on Monday as goalie Stuart Skinner turned aside 23 shots for his second career playoff shutout.
The game wasn’t that close. Adam Henrique scored twice in the first 13:03 and Evander Kane made it 3-0 with a goal early in the second period. Midway through the game, Vegas had just 10 shots on goal.
No surprise then that the Golden Knights, who also fell behind 2-0 to begin Game 3, are stressing the importance of a quick start on Wednesday.
“We have to start better,” Vegas coach Bruce Cassidy said.
“This is a couple games now where we’re chasing it. … Make sure we’re on our toes. I don’t think there were enough players on their toes, ready to go. That will be step one in Game 5, make sure we push the envelope early and get to our game quicker.”
“We were probably a little bit passive and didn’t put them on their heels enough,” Eichel said. “I think we need to be more aggressive offensively, try to force them to make mistakes on their breakouts and get pucks back, and then make plays when we have opportunities, and get pucks to the net.”
Edmonton coach Kris Knoblauch was asked about the importance of trying to close out the series on Wednesday.
“I don’t think we’re looking at how many games left that we have in the series,” Knoblauch said.
“It’s a one-game mentality. [After] we lost Game 3 the way we did, it was forget about it and move on to the next one. Obviously, there’s a lot of benefits of winning that next game. One, you don’t give that opportunity for Vegas to put together a string of wins.”
Knoblauch gave his team the day off on Tuesday before flying to Las Vegas.
“No meetings today,” Knoblauch said. “As a coach, you can only do so much. You don’t want to overcoach. I think today is a good day for the guys to step away, enjoy the win last night, and tomorrow they’ll get the message of what we need to do.”
The message is clear for the Golden Knights.
“You’re at home, Game 5,” Eichel said. “You win a game and go from there. It’s all that matters at this point.”
