(Las Vegas) We had a bit of everything on this very festive Monday night in Vegas: a knight fight to start, smoke, mass noise, goals… and Quebeckers celebrating.
The last time we saw Quebec celebrating like that around here was probably when Céline graced the city’s stages with her presence, and the least we can say is that the three players Québécois Golden Knights did not go unnoticed in this spectacular 7-2 victory over the Florida Panthers.
The Golden Knights now have a solid 2-0 lead in this series, and in the case of the Panthers, one now has to wonder if that was just a dream.
Quebec, then? Yes, because Jonathan Marchessault, Nicolas Roy and William Carrier quickly set the tone by participating in the first three goals, the first by Marchessault and the third by Roy. It was this goal that seemed to shake the goalkeeper of the visit, Sergei Bobrovsky, who was taken out following the next goal. His evening, in summary: 4 goals on only 13 shots. Not ideal.
“It started by leaving with the goal of Jonathan, it set the tone,” noted Nicolas Roy, smiling in front of his locker.
A little later on the media platform, Marchessault was still in coveralls while to his left, goalkeeper Adin Hill was already in a tie, “because he has to go places and I have my children” .
He was careful not to look triumphant.
“I didn’t think I played well in the first game, I missed games,” noted the striker. But I knew I could be better. »
While the guys from Quebec were celebrating, at the other end, Adin Hill continued to string together small miracles in front of his net. It’s not complicated, the Golden Knights goaltender is in the minds of Panthers players, who must wake up at night thinking of him. At some point, Matthew Tkachuk tried to knock him off his feet. It did not work.
Tkachuk recovered well a little later with a violent blow against Jack Eichel, perhaps to avenge another blow, that of Ivan Barbashev against Radko Gudas, who had to leave the match .
The problem for the Panthers in all of this? While Tkachuk chases after everyone, he doesn’t score. In fact, he took two misconduct penalties in that game, after another 10-minute penalty in the first. We understand that the Panthers forward does not want to live on love and friendship in the final, but if we do the math, that gives him 36 penalty minutes and one goal in two games. This is not a recipe for success.
All this made the fans here happy, super loud from one end to the other, to the point of shaking the stands of the T-Mobile Arena, temple of low frequencies in the carpet. Marchessault’s goal, 7:5 from the start of the game, really got the party going, and the noise didn’t stop after that, except maybe when the crowd started singing My Own Worst Enemy, a pop-punk classic from Lit, which is becoming a classic here too.
It ended in an uproar, with the Panthers players trying to “prepare” the next game.
“We saw it in previous series, they play the same,” Marchessault added. They eliminated teams like that, but we’re not going to get into that. »
And now, all these beautiful people are heading back to Florida for game number three. The Canadiens won’t be bringing the Cup home just yet, but at least the Golden Knights have three players who could do so shortly.
A night of two goals and an assist, which gives him a total of 12 goals since the start of the playoffs.
Reminder: It’s impossible to score from the penalty box.
The number of goals scored by Jonathan Marchessault in his last 12 games.
