So 2017 began with the Vegas Golden Knights furiously working away as an upstart organization in appropriated offices of a Bill Foley financial entity. No coach, no jersey and no players. Just a staff with an endless list of targets to hit.
But 2017 ended with the Golden Knights sitting atop the entire Western Conference. Simply put it is the most remarkable hockey story for the year 2017. It boggles the mind of people outside the organization and for those inside it too seems like a bit of a dream. So much was unknown prior to the drop of the puck on the 2017-18 season. How would the city respond to NHL hockey? What kind of a team had George McPhee assembled? Would the players bond and play together under head coach Gerard Gallant? Well, 2017 ended with the Golden Knights owning a record of 26-9-2. First in the West and second overall in the NHL.
The month of December punctuated what has been built in Vegas as the team went 11-1-1. They beat some of the NHL's top teams in the last month of 2017 including top-10 clubs; Tampa Bay, Nashville, Los Angeles, Washington and Toronto.
The prevailing question prior to the season was: How bad will Vegas be? There's a new question: How far can Vegas go?
Without further delay, here is the latest installment of our semi-regular trip around the VGK globe.
Lawless And Order
Vegas Golden Knights Insider Gary Lawless checks in with some observations from the team's December to remember.
![Karlsson](https://media.d3.nhle.com/image/private/t_ratio16_9-size20/f_auto/prd/qy5acnzp7pcnibormzlx.jpg)
Karlsson earns hat trick in Golden Knights' 6-3 win
Karlsson was named first star after a hat trick
TOR@VGK: Karlsson earns first hatty in Vegas history