Rookie goalie helps keep Golden Knights in playoff picture

The Golden Knights formed two different but equally euphoric mobs Saturday at T-Mobile Arena after their 5-4 overtime win over the Chicago Blackhawks.

One was for left wing Evgenii Dadonov, the improbable hero who shrugged off a voided trade last week to deliver the winning goal. The other was for a player who hadn’t experienced the recent highs and lows Dadonov had, but his story is even more unlikely in totality.

Goaltender Logan Thompson was told coming out of junior hockey to go to school, that he never would be good enough to play in the NHL. Now, not only is he in the league, he has come to the Knights’ rescue as they play for their playoff lives.

It’s the latest chapter in a saga that feels more and more storybook by the day. And Thompson isn’t done yet.

“I like to feel I’ve come a long way since my first game,” he said. “Way more calm and comfortable in net.”

Many teams would have been devastated coming off a 0-5-0 road trip, a skid this month that left the Knights clinging to a playoff spot by one point.

They needed to make a push to keep pace. And they needed to do so without starting goaltender Robin Lehner, who was sidelined after the first day of the trip with a lower-body injury. Backup Laurent Brossoit also became unavailable to start after the team returned home.

That meant the net now belonged to Thompson, the team’s No. 3 goalie. The guy who went undrafted. The one who went to the Knights’ first rookie camp but left without a contract. The player who last season became the first U Sports (the national governing body of college athletics in Canada) goaltender to appear in an NHL game since 1994.

It didn’t look like a recipe for success. But Thompson has turned doubters into believers his entire career.

“It’s the battle level,” coach Pete DeBoer said Saturday after Thompson made 10 saves in the third period and overtime. “That’s what battlers do. They find a way to recognize a moment and recognize that one big save at the right time can change a game.”

The win was Thompson’s fourth in 10 days. He’s made six straight starts since the Knights returned home March 17 and probably won’t get a game off until Lehner returns.

There’s no reason to remove him based on his play.

Thompson has a .927 save percentage in his past six games and has allowed 15 goals. His only poor outing was when he allowed four goals on 26 shots in Winnipeg on Tuesday, but he was playing for the second straight day after traveling from Minnesota. He didn’t get any help in that game, either, as the Knights were shut out.

The hot stretch makes the 25-year-old rookie 5-4-0 with a .914 save percentage and 2.89 goals-against average this season. It’s not perfect, but it has kept the Knights in the playoff picture.

“He’s done it in every league,” center Chandler Stephenson said. “Usually when you have guys like that, they have that fire. Kind of always had their doubters and things like that. He’s been awesome.”

Contact Ben Gotz at bgotz@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BenSGotz on Twitter.