Saturday’s outdoor game – which ended early on Sunday – between the Colorado Avalanche and Vegas Golden Knights in Lake Tahoe was nothing short of the sport has ever seen. This was because there was a nearly nine-hour delay due to the sun creating unsafe ice conditions earlier in the day.
The bright sun on the bright day simply caused too many problems during the first period. Several players and even a referee lost their footing on soft ice. After the first period, officials tried to work with the ice and covered portions of it with sails to keep the sun from it. The league finally decided to postpone the match to resume again at midnight ET / 21:00 PT.
As for the action that took place on the ice when it was deemed safe to play on, Avalanche center Nathan McKinnon proved why he is one of the most electrifying stars of the NHL. MacKinnon scored one goal and several assists in a 3-2 victory over the Golden Knights. It was the team’s second win over Vegas last week.
McKinnon easily provided the most exciting game of the day as he went end-to-end and put down a goal next to Vegas goalkeeper Marc-Andre Fleury’s blocker, throughout the second period, making the Avalanche 2-1 let it take precedence. The score came minutes after Golden Knights defender Alec Martinez tied the game at 1-1 through a setback in front of the Colorado net.
With less than seven minutes left in the third period, Devon Toews snatched a shot past Fleury off the face to make it 3-1. Golden Knights forward Alex Tuch, however, cut it off to a 3-2 game from a beautiful turn in front of Avalanche goalkeeper Philipp Grubauer to make it interesting, but it was ultimately too little too late.
During the first period, the Avalanche opened the scoring with a goal from defender Samuel Girard, thanks to a beautiful pass from MacKinnon, just 2:58.
In an effort to prevent a similar ice situation from occurring when the Flyers face the Browns Sunday, the league pushed the start time of that game from 14:00 to 19:00.