Welcome to the Three Stars of the Week segment. This will be a weekly post where I pick the Vegas Golden Knights’ three stars from the previous week. The first star will receive five points, the second star will receive three points, and the third star will receive one point. Points will be tallied throughout the season and one dollar per point will be donated to the charity of the winner’s choice at the end of the season.
Your Golden Knights had three games since our last three stars. It started out slow with a loss to the Colorado Avalanche, but skyrocketed back up with a big win against the Anaheim Ducks. The Golden Knights held a late lead, but Brendan Gallagher tied the game for the Montreal Canadiens, they ended up losing in overtime. However, they did get one point and are 1-1-1 in their last three games.
This week we have two newcomers joining the board and one receiving his first five-point star.
Third Star: Nicolas Roy (1 goal, 5 hits)
Despite only playing in one game last week, I am giving Nicolas Roy the third star because he scored his first NHL goal in his first Golden Knights game. Besides scoring, he also threw five hits and won four of six draws.
With Alex Tuch coming back into the lineup, he was sent down to the minors but should be the first call up if someone gets injured again. With Cody Eakin being a free agent at the end of the season, Roy is a possibility to replace him in the line up as they play a similar style while coming in at a much lower cap hit.
Second Star: Jonathan Marchessault (2 assists, 9 shots on goal)
Jonathan Marchessault is a goal scorer, but he is being snake bitten this season. He only has two goals thus far but has been getting his chances recently. Even though his stat line isn’t where he would like it to be, he brings energy and speed to his line and they are starting to click.
Against the Ducks he had a shot hit all three posts before bouncing in front of the net to go along with a number of chances against their division rival. Once that goal-scoring ketchup bottle opens, it is going to flow. But in the meantime, he’ll keep grinding along the walls and creating offense for his linemates.
First Star: William Karlsson (3 goals, 9 shots on goal)
William Karlsson is on a three-game goal-scoring streak and has eight points in his last 10. He looks like he is starting to find the finishing touch that helped him score 43 two seasons ago.
The line of him, Marchessault, and Reilly Smith are not the main concern of opposing teams anymore as the Golden Knights have three scoring lines so it opens up the match-ups they draw which is why these three are creating more opportunities in the last two weeks.
Karlsson jumps up to third in our standings with his first-star nod, but Mark Stone is still in first with 11 points.
I will keep a tally of the points all season long and donate a dollar per point to the winner’s charity of choice at the end of the season. Stay updated all season long by following me on Twitter, @LAM1926, to find out who will be next week’s three stars!
- Mark Stone: 11 points
- Marc-Andre Fleury: 8 points
- William Karlsson: 6 points
- Paul Stastny: 5 points
- Jonathan Marchessault: 3 points
- Tomas Nosek: 1 point
- Nick Holden: 1 point
- Nicolas Roy: 1 point