Knights conclude regular season with win No. 40

The Vegas Golden Knights wrap up the 2021 regular season with a record of 40-14-2 after a 6-0 shutout of the San Jose Sharks.

Vegas went 8-0 against San Jose this season.

“We played from game one right to the final buzzer of game 56 and threw our best record on the board,” head coach Peter DeBoer told ESPN. “Hopefully it’s enough for first. If it isn’t, I’m still really happy with the regular season that we had.”

Vegas now relies on the LA Kings to take down the Colorado Avalanche Thursday in hopes of re-claiming the first seed in the division.

As of now, it appears the Knights, despite a dominant regular season, will finish as the second seed and square off with the Minnesota Wild in the first round of the NHL playoffs as opposed to playing the St. Louis Blues.

Vegas went 6-2 against St. Louis this season, but only 3-5 against Minnesota.

Up next, the NHL playoffs. Vegas is set to square off against either the Minnesota Wild or the St. Louis Blues pending the winner of tomorrow’s LA-Colorado matchup.

The Knights can only control what they can control at this point, and they kept their first seed chances alive with a dominant showing against San Jose.

San Jose goalie Alexei Melnichuk struggled to keep shots in front of him as Vegas capitalized on a number of rebound opportunities.

Forwards Keegan Kolesar, Will Carrier and Dylan Sikura all scored on rebounded shots.

Sikura had two goals on the night, both in the third period.

In the first period, defensemen Alex Pietrangelo scored on a slick backhanded shot.

Offensive machine Johnathan Marchessault also scored his 18th goal of the year in the regular season finale.

“Hopefully we get a little luck and have a big game from LA and finish first,” Marchessault told ESPN. “If not, I thought our good season was good overall. Despite who we play in the first round, I think our team is ready for the playoffs.”

Starting goalie Marc-Andre Fleury is certainly ready for the postseason as the seasoned goaltender stopped all 19 shots including a miraculous save on a Patrick Marleau breakaway play.