Vegas Golden Knights 3-4 Anaheim Ducks: four goals from just 20 shots

Twenty shots. Four goals. Anaheim needed exactly twenty attempts to get the puck past Carter Hart at T-Mobile Arena, while Lukas Dostal turned aside 27 Vegas shots at the other end. The Golden Knights outshot the Ducks 30-20 and still lost 3-4 in Paradise.

The opening frame stayed quiet until Beckett Sennecke struck at minute 20, set up by Leo Carlsson, after early minors to Ivan Barbashev and a double from Cutter Gauthier. Then the second period buried the home side inside six minutes: Alex Killorn at 22, Jeff Malott at 23 — two goals inside a minute, Tim Washe assisting the second — and Carlsson again at 28 to make it 0-4. Rasmus Andersson's minor at 40 was the only penalty of the frame for either team, and it changed nothing.

Vegas finally surfaced in the third. Shea Theodore scored at 45 with Jack Eichel assisting, Tomas Hertl followed at 47 with Eichel involved again, and Braeden Bowman cut it to 3-4 at 58 off Victor Olofsson's pass. Eichel finished with two assists on two shots. The special teams told their own story: Vegas converted 1 of 3 power plays, Anaheim none of 2, and a Ducks minor at 45 came and went without settling the night.

Carlsson was the difference. He set up the opener, added the fourth goal himself and finished a plus-one on a night his side needed just 20 shots. Hart stopped 16 of 20 at the other end; Dostal's 27 saves made every other margin irrelevant.

Three goals in the third period, none in the first two. Vegas found its game forty minutes too late.