Stone scores late, Golden Knights defeat Kings in season opener

LOS ANGELES -- Bruce Cassidy won his coaching debut for the Vegas Golden Knights, 4-3 against the Los Angeles Kings in the season opener for each team at Crypto.com Arena on Tuesday.

Mark Stone scored with 26 seconds remaining in the third period on a wrist shot from the right face-off circle to win it.
Cassidy was hired June 14 to replace Peter DeBoer after the Golden Knights did not reach the Stanley Cup Playoffs last season.
"I think, for a coach, you're always worried that when you don't know your team that well -- it's our first [regular-season] game -- what will happen when things don't go well? It's always to me a sign of good character in the room when a team's resilient, so that's a big plus for me no matter how the score turned out," Cassidy said.
William Karlsson had a goal and an assist, Chandler Stephenson and Alex Pietrangelo each had two assists, and Logan Thompson made 27 saves for Vegas.
"A lot of ups and downs but, overall, I thought we played a pretty good 60 minutes," Stone said. "And we had our breakdowns, but that's just learning curves. If we can kind of cut those in half, we'll get it done."

Gabriel Vilardi had a goal and an assist, Arthur Kaliyev and Adrian Kempe scored, and Jonathan Quick made 47 saves for Los Angeles.
"We were still in it at the end of the night," Kings coach Todd McLellan said. "But obviously the focus is going to be on the play at the end, which makes no sense. It's hard to defend it. But our team gave up 51 shots on goal tonight."
It looked as if Los Angeles was content to get at least one point when defenseman Sean Durzi stood behind his own net in the final minute. He eventually attempted a stretch pass that was broken up by Pietrangelo, and Vegas was able to break in transition, with Stephenson finding Stone for the winning goal.
"It sure looked like it," Stone said when asked if he thought the Kings were going to run out the clock. "What was it, 45 seconds? That's a long time to kill. But I'm glad they didn't."
Kaliyev scored on a shot from the slot shortly after a power play ended to tie it 3-3 at 12:58 of the third period.

Karlsson redirected Pietrangelo's pass from the high slot to put Vegas up 3-2 at 7:17 of the third.
Kempe tied it 2-2 at 4:02 of the third, scoring into an open goal from the crease after Anze Kopitar got Thompson to commit on a fake and take himself out of the play.
"At times when we were connected, we were fast. Other times disconnected, the passing was off, timing was off," McLellan said. "Forwards wanted the puck, [defensemen] held on. Forwards needed to get the puck, or [the defensemen] needed to get the puck up, forwards weren't available. So, work to do."
Jack Eichel put the Golden Knight in front 2-1 at 1:27 of the third, scoring from a sharp angle from the goal line off the rebound of Stephenson's attempt after a power play expired.
"The way I look at it, power play, sometimes it's how timely is it, and I think it was very timely in that circumstance," Cassidy said, "So even though a couple of them in the middle of the game didn't look pretty, and we'll continue to work on it, timely goals are what matters."

Vilardi put the Kings up 1-0 at 10:36 of the first period on a wrist shot from the left circle.
Jonathan Marchessault tied it 1-1 at 1:41 of the second period, catching the Kings making a line change following the end of a power play for the Golden Knights. Marchessault scored from Karlsson on a 3-on-1 rush.
"The bottom line is we just can't afford to lose a game like that, especially with the amount of mistakes that we made," Kopitar said.
NOTES: Cassidy is 293-155-53 with nine ties in nine NHL seasons with the Golden Knights, Washington Capitals and Boston Bruins. … Kopitar got his 1,068th career point, one behind Dave Taylor for third in Kings history. It was Kopitar's 22nd point (nine goals, 13 assists) in 16 season-opening games; he has points in five straight openers (five goals, seven assists).… Stone has eight points (three goals, five assists) in four season-opening games for Vegas. … Quick's 47 saves were the second-highest total in his NHL career. He had 51 in a shutout win at the Detroit Red Wings on Dec. 13, 2010. … Marchessault has at least one goal in four of the Golden Knights' six season openers. … Vegas is 2-0-0 when opening a season on the road (2017-18). Only the New York Rangers (six games, 1927-28 to 1932-33) and Pittsburgh Penguins (three games, 1973-74 to 1975-76) have a longer streak from their inaugural season. … Forward Phil Kessel, in his Vegas debut, played his 983rd straight game. He is six behind Keith Yandle for the longest active streak in NHL history. … Forward Kevin Fiala made his Kings debut and was minus-1 with two shots in 15:24. He was acquired in a trade with the Minnesota Wild on June 29 and signed a seven-year, $55.125 million contract ($7.875 million average annual value) the next day. … Kings defenseman Drew Doughty played 25:03. He missed the final 24 regular-season games last season and the playoff loss to the Edmonton Oilers in the Western Conference First Round with a wrist injury that required surgery.