Fleury makes 34 saves for Golden Knights in shutout of Ducks

ANAHEIM -- Marc-Andre Fleury made 34 saves for his NHL-leading seventh shutout of the season for the Vegas Golden Knights, a 3-0 win against the Anaheim Ducks at Honda Center on Friday.

William Karlsson, Alex Tuch and Cody Eakin scored for the Golden Knights (35-26-5), who are nine points behind the San Jose Sharks for second in the Pacific Division and eight points ahead of the fourth-place Arizona Coyotes.
Mark Stone had an assist on Karlsson's goal for his first point since he was traded to Vegas from the Ottawa Senators on Monday.
WATCH: [All Golden Knights vs. Ducks highlights]
"We know the Ducks are low in the standings, but they still play hard," Fleury said. "They can get you, so it's nice to get the two points here."
John Gibson returned after missing the past nine games and made 31 saves for the Ducks (24-32-9), who have lost five straight games (0-5-0) and are 5-21-4 since Dec. 18.
"They're doing a lot of the right things," Anaheim assistant coach Marty Wilford said of the Ducks. "All you can continue to do is show them the positive stuff they're doing."
Karlsson gave the Golden Knights a 1-0 lead with a power-play goal at 14:49 of the first period.

With Anaheim's Jakob Silfverberg in the penalty box for delay of game, defenseman Shea Theodore passed the puck to Stone in the right face-off circle. Stone faked a shot, drawing Gibson from his crease, and passed to Karlsson in the left circle for a shot into an open net.
"[The power play] hasn't been going real well for the last six weeks, but they're moving the puck better and we've been working on it a lot," Vegas coach Gerard Gallant said. "Obviously, Stone makes a great pass."
Tuch made it 2-0 at 18:13 of the second period when he scored his first goal in 15 games dating to Jan. 21.
Jonathan Marchessault intercepted a pass by Daniel Sprong with the rest of the Ducks changing, and Marchessault made a long stretch pass to Tuch, who held off Anaheim rookie defenseman Brendan Guhle before backhanding the puck through Gibson's pads from in close.
"It felt pretty big for me," Tuch said. "At times, when you're not scoring over a long stretch of games, you get a little down on yourself, but I just wanted to come in and backcheck hard, forecheck even harder, and do what it takes for my team to win."

Eakin scored into an empty net with 21 seconds left for the 3-0 final.
Vegas is 7-1-0 against Anaheim in its first two seasons in the NHL.
The Ducks said they were encouraged by generating more scoring chances than in recent games, but they were shut out for the second time in three games and have scored five goals during the five-game losing streak.
"If you're not getting chances, you're not doing something right, but if you are getting chances, you're doing something right," Anaheim forward Corey Perry said. "It's a tough league to score goals in. You might get one or two (scoring chances) in a game, and that's it. You have to make good on those opportunities. Unfortunately, tonight, it didn't happen."

They said it

"We want to go make it four (wins) in a row. We are going to prepare for Sunday's match-up against [the] Vancouver [Canucks]. It's a Sunday funday 1 p.m. (PT), so we will be ready for it. We're excited. We've been playing really good hockey so far. We've got to clean up little bits and pieces and make sure we don't let teams back in the game." -- Golden Knights forward Alex Tuch
"We're taking care of our own end a lot better, and we're getting out of our end a lot better. We'll have to continue to show the chances we had tonight. Scoring chances were 9-3 in the second period, but it's tough coming out of that period when you're down two." -- Ducks assistant coach Marty Wilford

Need to know

It was the 55th shutout of Fleury's NHL career, moving him past Bernie Parent, Ed Giacomin and Pekka Rinne for 21st in NHL history. ... Theodore got his 30th point of the season with an assist on Karlsson's goal, surpassing the NHL career high he set last season with the Golden Knights. He played his first 53 NHL games with the Ducks from 2015-17. … Perry played his 971st NHL game, moving into a tie for most in Anaheim history with Ryan Getzlaf, who has missed the past five games with an upper-body injury.

What's next

Golden Knights: Host the Vancouver Canucks on Sunday (4 p.m. ET; ATTSN-RM, SNP, NHL.TV)
Ducks: Host the Colorado Avalanche on Sunday (4 p.m. ET; FS-W, ALT, NHL.TV)