Knights aim to avoid dubious history vs. Red Wings

The Vegas Golden Knights will try to avoid breaking the franchise record for longest home losing streak Saturday night when they face the Detroit Red Wings in Las Vegas.

Vegas has lost five in a row at T-Mobile Arena, matching a five-game home skid from Jan. 21-Feb. 14, 2019. The Golden Knights have also lost four straight games overall, one short of the franchise mark of five set from March 8-15, 2022.

The defending Stanley Cup champions, who are in fourth place in the Pacific Division and occupy the second wild-card spot in the Western Conference, have lost seven of their past eight games (1-6-1).

In an effort to end the slump, general manager Kelly McCrimmon was very active at the trade deadline, bringing in sought-after defensemen Noah Hanifin from the Calgary Flames as well as forwards Anthony Mantha from the Washington Capitals and Tomas Hertl from the San Jose Sharks.

"We wanted to help our team," McCrimmon said. "Our recent play hasn't been good enough. We know that. We'll fix that."

They will have to wait a while for Hertl, who has 15 goals in 48 games, to join the lineup. He is currently on injured reserve after having left knee surgery on Feb. 12 to clean out loose cartilage but is expected to return in the regular season.

The Golden Knights had extra money to spend at the deadline after putting captain Mark Stone on long-term injured reserve. Stone sustained a lacerated spleen in a collision with Nashville's Yakov Trenin on Feb. 20.

"He'll miss at least the rest of the regular season," McCrimmon said of Stone. "I don't know how much more than that he will miss. It's really an unknown for us."

Mantha and Hanifin both played in the Golden Knights' 3-1 loss to Vancouver on Thursday but didn't register a point. Mantha picked up a four-minute high-sticking double-minor on his first shift when he cut Nils Hoglander under his right eye.

It was shortly after Vegas killed that penalty that Vancouver scored two goals in a 55-second span.

"Again we put ourselves in a hole early on," Golden Knights forward Nicolas Roy said. "I guess we didn't have the push to get back into the game."

Detroit, which holds the first wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference, also brings a four-game losing streak into the contest after a 4-0 defeat against the Arizona Coyotes in the front end of a back-to-back on Friday at Tempe, Ariz.

It was the second time in three games that the Red Wings were blanked. Detroit has been outscored 20-5 during the losing streak.

"We've got to get back to it. We're in a little bit of a rut right now," Red Wings defenseman Jake Walman said. "Good teams find a way out of this stuff, and every team kind of goes through it. This is crunch time right now. We've got to find our way out real quick."

It'll will be the third road game in four nights for Detroit, which opened the trip with a 7-2 loss to the Colorado Avalanche on Wednesday.

"If you expect to be in the (playoff) picture at the end of the year, these are going to be the types of games you've got to play," Walman said. "You're not going to be energized all the time, but it's playoff hockey now every game so it doesn't matter.

"We know what the standings are and we have to put our best foot forward every game."