Before the season began, one aspect of the schedule we thought would be favorable for the Golden Knights was that 15 of their 82 opponents are playing Vegas on the second night of a back-to-back. So far, VGK have completed seven such games with a record of 5-2-0, including wins over Minnesota, Calgary, and St. Louis, with losses coming to Los Angeles and Utah.
Historically, Vegas has won 67% of these games, which is close to the 71% mark they’ve put up through the first seven. With eight to go, they’ll likely win at least five, maybe including the next one, Sunday’s affair with Marc-Andre Fleury and the Minnesota Wild.
Facing a team on the second night of a back-to-back typically means a look at the backup goalie. That’s been the case in six of those seven games. However, for whatever reason, Vegas tends to face the backup much more often than just in back-to-back spots.
This year, the Golden Knights have faced either the backup or third goalie in 17 of the 40 games and they have feasted on them. Vegas are a stellar 16-1-0 against backups this season, accounting for over half of their season point total in the standings.
As pointed out by resident goalie nerd, The Athletic’s Jesse Granger (his tweet was the reason I decided to look into this), VGK are on quite a run against backups too, winning 10 straight games against opposing backups.
Vegas boasts just a 12-8-3 record against starting goalies this year. That’s just a 96-point pace over an 82-game season. And, of the 12 wins, just five are against playoff teams (COL, EDM, EDM, DAL, WPG). They are all from the Western Conference though, which bodes well for the future. Against the starters, the Golden Knights average 3.3 goals per game while they boast a much healthier 3.9 against backups despite being shut out by third-stringer Jaxson Stauber.
It’s not like Vegas have been terrible against the better goalies in the league, but it’s definitely a bit of a red flag when analyzing the record as a whole. 32 of VGK’s 59 points have come against backup goalies and they have an insane .941 points percentage in those games.
Of course, you can only play whoever they put in front of you and the standings don’t differentiate which opposing goalie was in the net when it comes to deciding who makes the playoffs.
Opposing Goalies (G1 = Goalie #1, G2 = Goalie #2, G3 = Goalie #3)
COL – Georgiev – G1 – WIN
^STL – Binnington – G1 – WIN
^ANA – Reimer – G3 – WIN
WSH – Thompson – G1 – LOSS
TBL – Vasilevskiy – G1 – LOSS
FLA – Bobrovsky – G1 – OTL
^LAK – Rittich – G2 – WIN
OTT – Ullmark – G1 – WIN
SJS – Vanecek – G1 – WIN
CGY – Vladar – G2 – WIN
LAK – Kuemper – G1 – LOSS
UTA – Ingram – G2 – WIN
EDM – Skinner – G1 – WIN
SEA – Daccord – G1 – OTL
CAR – Kochetkov – G1 – LOSS
ANA – Dostal – G1 – WIN
UTA – Valjmelka – G1 – WIN
WSH – Thompson – G1 – LOSS
TOR – Woll – G1 – LOSS
OTT – Ullmark – G1 – WIN
MTL – Montembeault – G1 – WIN
PHI – Fedotov – G2 – WIN
COL – Georgiev – G1 – OTL
WPG – Comrie – G2 – WIN
^UTA – Stauber – G3 – LOSS
EDM – Skinner – G1 – WIN
ANA – Gibson – G2 – WIN
DAL – Oettinger – G1 – WIN
WPG – Hellebuyck – G1 – WIN
EDM – Skinner – G1 – LOSS
^MIN – Wallstedt – G3 – WIN
VAN – Lankinen – G2 – WIN
SEA – Grubauer – G2 – WIN
^ANA – Gibson – G2 – WIN
SJS – Georgiev – G2 – WIN
^CGY – Vladar – G2 – WIN
MTL – Montembeault – G1 – LOSS
PHI – Kolosov – G3 – WIN
BUF – Reimer – G2 – WIN
SJS – Georgiev – G2 – WIN
^team playing 2nd of B2B
