Golden Knights' Cup Quest Starts With First Ever Playoff Win

LAS VEGAS, NV - Vegas Golden Knights head coach Gerard Gallant summed up the feelings of an entire city Wednesday night in his postgame press conference.

"We didn't expect to be here to be honest with you, but once the season got going we knew we were a good hockey team," Gallant said.

Before the NHL season began, you could sit all the people who thought the expansion Golden Knights would be hosting the first game of the Stanley Cup Playoffs on a blackjack table. But, like Gallant said, here we are.

And oh boy, has Las Vegas embraced its only major professional sports team as its inaugural dream season rolled on in front of a record hometown crowd that stuffed T-Mobile Arena Wednesday night, hoping to see their Golden Knights earn the franchise's first ever playoff victory. A goal from Shea Theodore three minutes into the game and 30 saves from Marc-Andre Fleury was enough to give them what they came for as the Golden Knights took a 1-0 series lead against the Los Angeles Kings in the opening round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. That hometown crowd appreciated the landmark victory.

"I think that's the loudest I've heard this building," Fleury said after shutting out the Kings. "It was rocking."

The Golden Knights jumped out to a 1-0 series lead against their Pacific Division foes. More importantly they showed that a 109-point regular season wasn't a fluke for the infant franchise.

"There's a lot of guys, that was their first playoff game," Fleury said. "Everybody kept their cool and played a strong game, played a game our coach wants us to play, right? So it was good."

The Golden Knights will look to take a 2-0 series lead Friday night in Las Vegas. The puck drops for Game 2 at 7 p.m. at T-Mobile Arena.

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