Vegas Golden Knights embarrassed in 7-1 loss to Senators

The Vegas Golden Knights put together their most inspired effort of the season two days ago.

They followed it up with one of their worst performances in franchise history in a 7-1 drubbing by the Ottawa Senators at Canadian Tire Centre on Sunday.

The Knights made the trek to Ottawa less than 48 hours after banding together to win for Mitch Marner in his return to Toronto.

It was the kind of team effort that other clubs hope to reach every night.

That went out the window quickly. The Knights (25-14-12) lost in regulation in Ottawa for the first time ever (6-1-1) and it tied for the worst margin of defeat in team history against the 15th-ranked team in the Eastern Conference.

“It looked like an NHL team versus a junior team,” captain Mark Stone said.

Defenseman Rasmus Andersson scored his first goal as a member of the Knights with 4:55 remaining to end Ottawa goalie Mads Sogaard’s shutout bid.

Adin Hill tied a career-high of seven goals allowed — four on 17 shots through two periods — as the Knights dropped to 1-2 on the four-game road trip.

It was the second time on the road trip the Knights trailed 4-0 after two periods.

The Knights rallied to lose 4-3 in Boston on Thursday but still had some fight to make it an interesting game late.

That wasn’t the case this time.

“Just starting on time, really,” Jack Eichel said. “It’s been a recurring thing for us this year. You just don’t want to do it every night. That’s a desperate team over there.”

The Knights played their third game in four days, but the Senators (24-21-7) were playing the second night of a back-to-back after losing 4-1 to Carolina at home.

“I didn’t like our battle level at all, our compete, our races early on,” Knights coach Bruce Cassidy said. “Typically we’re the team with pushback. We didn’t have that.”

Here are three takeaways from the loss:

1. Writing was on the wall

The Knights had a chance to put the pressure on early.

Marner was awarded a penalty shot 1:36 into the game after a hooking call on Ottawa’s Tyler Kleven.

Marner skated from left to right and tried three different moves to get room on Sogaard, but failed to get a shot off.

“I’m sure if Mitch had it back, he would’ve had a different alternative,” Cassidy said. “The way the game played out, maybe it only makes it a 7-2 game.”

From then on, the Knights looked disheveled. Puck management was poor. They kept turning over the puck. Getting through the neutral zone was an issue all game.

Ottawa took advantage. Forward Fabian Zetterlund banked a shot off Hill from behind the net at 9:25 for a 1-0 lead.

2. Unraveling from there

The Knights had a five-on-three power play for 37 seconds toward the end of the first and going into the second. Another chance to gain some momentum.

They had four shots on the extended man advantage and couldn’t beat Sogaard.

Ottawa made the Knights pay with two goals in 16 seconds from Dylan Cozens and Jordan Spence to make it 3-0 at 6:07.

Stephen Halliday scored with 2:10 left in the second to push the lead to four.

Cozens and Halliday scored again in the third period 43 seconds apart.

“Sometimes you get kicked in the teeth, get up and get yourself back in the game,” Stone said. “For the most part, we usually do that. For some reason, we didn’t do that.”

3. Finishing the trip strong

The Knights wrap up their four-game road trip Tuesday in Montreal. They’ll have to do it with Stone having his franchise-record 14-game point streak end Sunday.

Eichel also had his 11-game point streak come to an end.

All but five skaters were a negative in plus-minus.

“It wasn’t a great night for us at all. Not good enough from everybody,” said Eichel, the team’s leading scorer. “We’ve got to be a lot better, and it starts with me. I got to be better, as well. We’ll take a look at this one and get ready for Tuesday.”

Eichel said there have been elements in the team game that they’ve gotten away from.

But with two weeks until the Olympic break, Cassidy said it’s too late for that to be happening.

“It certainly isn’t up to (my standard),” Cassidy said. “It’s late January. Is this a practice thing, or is it showing the hell up on time?”

Contact Danny Webster at dwebster@reviewjournal.com. Follow @DannyWebster21 on X.