Tomas Hertl’s career-high 5 points help Vegas blow out Sharks
Tomas Hertl scored two goals and added three assists, Jack Eichel also scored twice, and the visiting Vegas Golden Knights completed a sweep of its season series with the San Jose Sharks for the third straight season with a 7-2 victory on Sunday night.
It was a career-best five-point game Hertl and the 46th multi-goal game of Eichel's career. Pavel Dorofeyev scored a goal and had two assists, Mark Stone had three assists and defensemen Zach Whitecloud and Shea Theodore also scored for Vegas, which won its fourth straight game and 11th in a row over the Sharks. The Golden Knights also improved to 16-0-3 all-time in the regular-season against the Sharks in games played in San Jose and 31-2-5 all-time.
Carl Lindbom made 18 saves to pick up his second career victory and Noah Hanifin added two assists for Vegas, which extended its Pacific Division lead to three points over Edmonton.
Collin Graf and Alexander Wennberg scored goals for San Jose, which had a three-game win streak snapped. Yaroslav Askarov finished with 26 saves.
Vegas took a 1-0 lead at the 7:19 mark of the first period when Eichel jammed in a rebound of his own shot to extend his goal streak to three games.
San Jose tied it midway through the period when Graf intercepted a Whitecloud clearing pass and fired a wrist shot past Lindbom's glove side.
The Golden Knights regained the lead on Dorofeyev's team-leading 11th power play goal, roofing a touch pass from Hertl inside the right post.
Vegas then scored three consecutive goals in the first 12 1/2 minutes of the second period to break the game open and extend its lead to 5-1. Eichel made it 3-1 when he ripped a wrist shot from the left circle. Hertl followed with a power-play goal with a tap-in in front of the net and 85 seconds later Whitecloud one-timed a shot from above the right circle through traffic.
Wennberg cut the lead to 5-2 near the end of the period with a one-timer from the right circle.
San Jose pulled Askarov for an extra attacker with 4:10 remaining and Theodore fired in a length-of-the-ice empty-netter from behind his own goal line to make it 6-2. Hertl finished the scoring with a one-timer from the right circle with 1:01 to go.
San Jose forward Macklin Celebrini, third in the league in scoring with 70 points, had a 13-game point streak snapped.