Golden Knights defeat Canucks to end 5-game skid

Jack Eichel scored a goal and had an assist and Mark Stone added two assists as the Vegas Golden Knights snapped a five-game losing streak with a 5-2 victory over the Vancouver Canucks on Wednesday night in Las Vegas.

Cole Reinhardt, Ivan Barbashev, Pavel Dorofeyev and Alexander Holtz also scored goals and Akira Schmid made 21 saves for the Golden Knights, who broke a first-place tie with Edmonton, a 4-3 loser at Calgary earlier Wednesday, in the Pacific Division.

Elias N. Pettersson and Pierre-Olivier Joseph scored goals and Teddy Blueger added two assists for Vancouver, which suffered its third straight loss and fell for the 17th time in its last 19 games.

Kevin Lankinen finished with 26 saves for the Canucks, who head into the Olympic break still searching for their first road victory of 2026. Vancouver last won away from home on Dec. 29 at Seattle, 3-2, in a shootout, a streak of eight straight losses.

After a scoreless first 25 minutes, the two teams combined for four goals in the span of 2 1/2 minutes.

Vegas took a 1-0 lead at the 5:09 mark of the second period when Eichel ripped a wrist shot from the high slot off a Rasmus Andersson pass off the far post for his 20th goal, the ninth time he has hit the 20-goal mark in his career.

Reinhardt, breaking down the slot, made it 2-0, deking Lankinen and then tucking a forehand shot around his right pad.

Pettersson then put Vancouver on the board 37 seconds later with a wrist shot from the top of the left circle that beat Schmid five-hole.

Barbashev roofed a wrist shot off a Stone drop pass 28 seconds later to increase the Vegas lead to 3-1, extending his goal streak to a career-best four games.

Joseph scored with 7.8 seconds left in the period to cut the lead to 3-2, snapping a shot from the left point through heavy traffic and past Schmid's glove side.

The Golden Knights then broke the game open early in the third period with goals one minute apart by Dorofeyev and Holtz.