LAS VEGAS (AP) It was a great time for Vegas Golden Knights owner Bill Foley to visit the locker room after their latest win.The Golden Knights had just beaten one of the NHL’s Original Six teams Cam Ward Jersey Womens , set another record for an expansion team in its inaugural season, and they also leapfrogged the Tampa Bay Lightning for the top spot in the NHL standings with 82 points.Reilly Smith had two goals and an assist to lead Vegas to a 6-3 win over the struggling Montreal Canadiens on Saturday night.Article continues below ...”It’s fantastic for us, it’s fantastic for the team, it’s fantastic for the fans – I love it,” Foley said. ”It’s really unbelievable and I wish Reilly would have gotten that last goal for a hat trick, because he deserves it.”Foley admitted when the season started he didn’t think he’d be doing interviews this late in the season, but with his team clearly headed to the playoffs, he didn’t mind fielding questions.”I knew we had a good team,” Foley said. ”When we did the expansion draft, it was a lot of hard work, and we put a lot of planning into it. We had five mock draft sessions in the expansion draft. We knew what we were getting. The result is what we have.”What Vegas has, is a team that improved to 22-4-2 at T-Mobile Arena, matching the 1979-80 Hartford Whalers (22-12-6) for the most home wins by a team in its first season.Since their 3-2 loss in Montreal on Nov. 7, the Golden Knights are 30-10-3 while the Canadiens are 15-21-6.Brad Hunt Matt Hunwick Jersey Womens , Tomas Nosek, Ryan Carpenter, Nate Schmidt also scored for Vegas, while Jonathan Marchessault had three assists. Marc-Andre Fleury stopped 30 shots, including a highlight-reel glove save on Charles Hudon skating in on a breakaway in the third period, to improve to 19-6-2.”We just want to play the same way that’s made us successful and keep going forward and not kind of relax a bit, we just want to stay with it,” Hunt said. ”We still got a lot of work to do. We just take it day by day, we’re not looking too far forward.”Hudon, Nikita Scherbak and Jonathan Drouin scored for Montreal. Antti Niemi started and gave up three goals on six shots before being replaced by Carey Price midway through the first period. Price, who came into the game having lost eight straight road games, finished with 24 saves.Montreal, which fell to 2-5-1 this month, has the league’s worst road record at 8-19-1. The Canadiens have lost 11 of their last 12 away from home and have been outscored 41-16 during the slide.”It’s always tough when you lose Jeff Skinner Jersey Womens ,” Scherbak said. ”We’re trying to stick together. We have a great group of guys here, everybody supports each other, and nobody is happy to lose.”Smith got the scoring going with his seventh power-play goal of the season after taking Schmidt’s pass and one-time a laser past Niemi 2:16 into the game.The Golden Knights scored with the man advantage for the 12th time in 13 games, finishing 1 for 2 on the night. Vegas also improved to 24-3-0 when scoring the first goal of the game and their .889 win percentage when recording the opening mark leads the NHL.”First goal has been huge for us this year,” Smith said. ”Our record is pretty outstanding when we score the first one. But it’s teams like that, if you let them stay around, they’re the ones that are going to make you pay. Those leads are huge at the start and they help us out.”Hudon tied it a couple of minutes later, as he skated past Hunt and used a nifty move to beat Fleury.But Hunt made amends for losing Hudon down the boards when he drilled a slap shot from the point to put Vegas ahead. Nosek’s goal made it 3-1 and sent Niemi to the bench.Scherbak got his first goal of the season to cut the lead to 3-2 with 8:13 left in the opening period.Carpenter scored his fifth goal in seven games 3:07 into the second period, and Smith got his second of the game 37 seconds later to make it 5-2.Schmidt got his fifth on a pass from Smith to give Vegas a four-goal lead four minutes into the third.Just 13 seconds into a power play, Drouin fired a slap shot into the back of the net at 8:44 to close the scoring.NOTES: Montreal D Joe Morrow played in his 100th career game, while F Paul Byron played in his 100th consecutive game. … When Price entered the game he tied Patrick Roy for second in team history for most games played by a goalie. … Canadiens C Tomas Plekanec moved into seventh place for the most games played in team history. … Golden Knights defenseman Luca Sbisa is now one point away from 100 for his career.UP NEXTMontreal: At Philadelphia on Tuesday.Vegas: Hosts Anaheim on Monday. WASHINGTON (AP) For a few moments, it looked as if the Detroit Red Wings were headed for another embarrassing loss. Then Tomas Tatar stepped up again.Tatar scored his second goal of the game 2:47 into overtime, and the Red Wings escaped with a 5-4 victory over the Washington Capitals on Sunday.Detroit had dropped three in a row. It blew a 5-2 third-period lead against the New York Islanders on Friday and lost 7-6 in overtime.”A lot of people expected us to fold after a tough game,” coach Jeff Blashill said. ”I thought we got back up real well.”Tatar beat Braden Holtby for his 14th goal of the season. He also scored with 11 seconds to play in the second period to give Detroit a 4-1 lead.Justin Abdelkader Jaycob Megna Jersey Womens , Luke Glendening and Anthony Mantha also scored for the Red Wings, and Jimmy Howard made 23 saves in his first win since Jan. 5.”It was tough. I was worried it might be the same story as against the Islanders,” Tatar said. ”You don’t want that to happen. I felt really bad after the game. If you have two in a row like that, it would be just miserable.”Dylan Larkin, who assisted on both of Tatar’s goals, felt the team stayed together after Nicklas Backstrom tied it for Washington with 17 seconds to play.”All right, we’ve got 17 seconds and OT,” Larkin said. ”The encouraging thing is we can play like that. We can have teams on the ropes – and good teams on the ropes.”Alex Ovechkin scored his NHL-best 33rd goal for Washington, which was coming off a home-and-home sweep of Columbus. Brett Connolly, Dmitry Orlov and Backstrom scored in the third, and Holtby stopped 24 shots.Ovechkin’s 10th power-play goal made it 1-0 at 4:20 in the first period. Evgeny Kuznetsov picked up an assist on the play, extending his point streak to a team-high seven straight games.The Red Wings responded with four straight goals, including three during a dominant performance in the second.Abdelkader stole the puck at the red line and tied it at 1 with his ninth of the season at 13:37 of the first. Glendening and Mantha scored nine seconds apart in the second, and Tatar’s first goal gave the Red Wings a 4-1 lead.”It’s not good enough. No one wants to play like that in the second Max Jones Jersey Womens ,” Washington center Jay Beagle said.”We can’t leave our goalie out to dry, and it’s been happening a lot lately. They’ve been holding us in there and getting us wins, but it’s starting to show now.”The Capitals pulled within one on goals by Connolly and Orlov. They had a two-man advantage when they pulled Holtby and Dan Dekeyser was called for holding with 1:15 left, and Backstrom tied it with his 13th goal.NOTES: Washington coach Barry Trotz said F Lars Eller, who signed a five-year, $17.5 million contract extension Saturday, should be able to play more confidently. ”Now, he knows he’s going to be here,” Trotz said. ”It makes us strong up the middle.” … Detroit F Todd Bertuzzi, who committed a costly penalty that led to the Red Wings’ ugly loss to the Islanders on Friday, was a healthy scratch.UP NEXTRed Wings: Host Anaheim on Tuesday.Capitals: Begin a four-game trip Tuesday at Winnipeg.—
