It was good news, bad news for the first Golden Knights' practice at City National Arena since late January.
On one hand, Tomas Nosek returned to practice for the first time since taking a late hit to his shoulder from Alexei Emelin. Nosek was sporting a red no-contact jersey, so he's still some days away. On the other hand, Malcolm Subban was nowhere to be found, as the team relied on an emergency goalie in his stead.
Gerard Gallant revealed that Subban suffered an upper-body injury during morning skate in San Jose. Subban did back up Marc-Andre Fleury that night, but no timetable was given for his return. In his place, Maxime Lagace has been recalled from Chicago.
As for the road trip itself, despite grabbing eight points out of 12, the Knights played far from their best hockey. In fact, Gallant referred to their play as sleepy on two separate occasions. I asked him if this sluggishness was a symptom of a long season or the extended trip or something to be concerned about going forward.
The first four games of that trip were in all different time zones. So we're traveling, getting in at 3 AM. I thought the first three of those four games were really tough. They battled hard, but it took a lot of energy. It catches up to you after a while.
You're going to have periods like that, it's just about how you respond.
Vegas responded well in Washington after a tough outing against Minnesota; they also bounced back from an awful first period in San Jose.
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Some fans were surprised that Lagace was called up instead of Oscar Dansk. Don't be -- Dansk has yet to appear in a game in Chicago since his late January return, which means he hasn't seen action at any level since October 30th, when he got hurt in Brooklyn. Lagace replaced Dansk that night and kept the Knights afloat through November.
(On Dansk, Wolves GM Wendell Young stated that he will finally see game action this week.)
Anyway, last month, I caught up with Lagace in San Diego, where the Wolves were visiting. At the time, Chicago was in the midst of a 14-game points streak, which started with Lagace's return from Vegas. Both Wolves Head Coach Rocky Thompson
and Brandon Pirri spoke on how Lagace came back down a different goalie.
This is what Thompson said about Lagace's role in Chicago's success:
Our goaltender has been the biggest difference.
Our team was playing pretty good at the beginning of the year, we just weren't able to get that save.
Max was up there [in the NHL], he was under an extreme amount of pressure. That was the greatest test. There was nobody else at that point -- Dylan Robinson, or Ferguson, was backing him up. He wasn't going to play. So Max had no choice. If things were getting out of hand, he was going to play. That's extremely tough mentally.
The goaltending position is so much mental, having confidence in yourself, not quitting. I think that really was a shift in his mind-set.
When we got him back, he was a different goalie than when we had him [earlier this season].
Lagace agreed that his time in the NHL changed him for the better:
For sure, I feel a lot more confident. You always wonder if you're capable of playing up there. I'm a better goalie than I was before.
Perhaps the chief architect of Lagace's evolution is Vegas Goaltending Coach Dave Prior. For Lagace, Prior was a breath of fresh air.
He's had a huge impact on me.
I've had a lot of goalie coaches, but Dave has a little different approach to the game. I think that's what I needed to get to the next level. Now I know I can do it.
He told me when I met him it's going to be different than what I had before.
I pressed him for specifics:
A more aggressive style, it's where you see a big improvement in my game.
I'm a calm guy, but he made me trust my feet more. Be more aggressive on the shooters. Read the game better.
It's hard to say if we'll see Lagace get any action in his second NHL stint -- the Knights' next back-to-back game is on February 27th and Subban might not be gone long -- but if we do, it'll be a different Lagace than the nervous netminder that we saw for the first time at Barclays Center.
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When I saw Lagace last month, he was wearing a Chicago Wolves mask, which was interesting because he has a "300"-themed Golden Knights mask.
Anyway, Lagace also gave some background about his NHL mask:
Ever since I was a kid, that was one of my favorite movies. As soon as I signed with the Golden Knights, I knew [my mask] was going to be "300." It was also my first junior mask. This was a good opportunity to bring it back.
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