Golden Knights’ Alex Pietrangelo likes NHL COVID testing change

Golden Knights at Lightning

Knights win 3-2 (SO)

RJ’s three stars

■ 3. Lightning right wing Corey Perry — He had a goal and an assist for his third game of the season with at least two points. Perry scored the game-tying goal with 2:48 left in regulation.

■ 2. Knights center Brett Howden — He had a goal and an assist against the team that drafted him 27th overall in 2016. He has a goal in his past two games and points in his past three.

■ 1. Knights goaltender Robin Lehner — He made 27 saves, then stopped four of seven shootout attempts for his third win in his past four starts. He has a .942 save percentage in that span.

Key play

Mark Stone’s shootout winner.

The Knights captain was the 14th player to go in the shootout. If he scored, the Knights would win. If he didn’t, the sides would go another round.

Stone made sure that didn’t happen. He skated fast to the edge of the left circle before darting inside on his forehand. That got Lightning all-world goaltender Andrei Vasilevskiy to bite to his left enough for Stone to beat him to his right with a quick wrist shot.

It was the 14th shootout attempt of Stone’s career and his third goal. He had been 0-for-2 in shootouts with the Knights.

Key stat

7 — The number of shootout rounds.

That’s a record for the Knights, who had six-round shootouts Dec. 8, 2017, and Feb. 20, 2019. They went 1-1.

Lehner improved to 13-26 in his career in shootouts with a .545 save percentage. He is 3-1 this season with a .688 save percentage (11-for-16).

Knights quotable

“Vasilevskiy is the best goalie in the league, hands down for the last five years. He should have the Vezina every year. But I’m confident. I look at my stats through the last five years, they’re up there with him.” — Lehner

Testing change

The Knights are getting closer to a relaxation of the NHL’s COVID-19 testing policy.

The NHL will not test fully vaccinated and staff during the All-Star break that begins Friday. There will be a single test to get back in team facilities, and then there will be limited “for cause” testing for fully vaccinated staff and players if they’re symptomatic or need to test to cross the Canadian border.

Defenseman Alex Pietrangelo is looking forward to it. The Knights are fully vaccinated, which means they should have fewer players enter the NHL’s COVID-19 protocol after the break. Pietrangelo is one of 15 players on the team who has been in it this season. So has coach Pete DeBoer and two of his assistants. Center Chandler Stephenson and defenseman Dylan Coghlan went in Saturday.

“I don’t think anyone’s had any symptoms, so we probably wouldn’t be testing anybody at this point,” Pietrangelo said. “That’ll keep more guys in the lineup.”

Knights’ next 10

Vs. Buffalo, 7 p.m. Tuesday

At Edmonton, 6 p.m. Feb. 8

At Calgary, 6:30 p.m. Feb. 9

Vs. Colorado, 7 p.m. Feb. 16

Vs. Los Angeles, 7 p.m. Feb. 18

At San Jose, 5 p.m. Feb. 20

At Arizona, 6:30 p.m. Feb. 25

Vs. Colorado, 7 p.m. Feb. 26

Vs. San Jose, 7 p.m. March 1

Vs. Boston, 6 p.m. March 3

Contact Ben Gotz at bgotz@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BenSGotz on Twitter.