Golden Knights try out new players as penalty killers

Alex Tuch hasn’t killed penalties in, well, the Golden Knights winger was embarrassed to say how long it’s been.

“A whiiiile,” he confessed, emphasizing that last word for effect.

Tuch is hoping to add penalty killing to his list of duties and got his first work Tuesday during the Knights’ 5-0 preseason road victory over Colorado.

He teamed with forward Tomas Nosek on the top unit and helped the Knights successfully kill all six Avalanche power plays.

“I was able to watch some really good penalty killers the last two years, and I’ve paid attention,” Tuch said. “I think I did a pretty good job out there. There’s some little things I’ve got to learn, try to get a little hesitation in my game on the penalty kill because I’m still really new.”

Tuch said he likes the idea of killing penalties in part because it allows him to stay loose, even when the Knights get into penalty trouble. He logged 2:02 of ice time on the penalty kill against the Avalanche as part of his 16:11 of action.

In 158 career NHL games, Tuch has been on the ice short-handed for a little less than four minutes (3:57 to be exact).

“But you know what? It gives me a lot of confidence that (coach Gerard Gallant) has confidence in me to be able to go out there and penalty kill,” the 23-year-old said.

Gallant also used winger William Carrier in short-handed situations, as the Knights look to replace penalty-killing specialist Pierre-Edouard Bellemare along with Ryan Carpenter.

Carrier totaled 45 seconds of penalty-killing time in his 91 career games with the Knights, but has experience in that role with Buffalo.

“If they give me my chance, I’ll take my opportunity,” Carrier said.

Tuch and Carrier are two of the Knights’ fastest skaters, and Gallant said that separates them from the Knights’ other penalty killers.

“Those guys, they can skate, they can move their feet and they can get some good clears,” Gallant said. “As long as they get the pattern down, we’ll give them some opportunities (in the preseason) and see where it goes.”

Time changes

The Knights announced new start times for two regular-season games.

The Nov. 16 matchup at Los Angeles will start at 1 p.m. rather than 7 p.m., and the Nov. 17 game against Calgary begins at 4 p.m. at T-Mobile Arena.

The latter date was moved up an hour to accommodate the Rock ’n’ Roll Marathon.

No. 1 on StubHub

The Golden Knights are the top-selling NHL team on the ticket exchange website StubHub for the third straight season, according to a release by the company Wednesday.

StubHub said the Knights outsell the second-best team, the New York Rangers, by 28 percent.

The other top selling teams are the Boston Bruins, Chicago Blackhawks, Toronto Maple Leafs, Montreal Canadiens, St. Louis Blues, Nashville Predators, Pittsburgh Penguins and Buffalo Sabres.

Roster cuts

The Knights made their first round of training camp cuts, reassigning forward Mason Primeau and defensemen Xavier Bouchard, Connor Corcoran and Kaedan Korczak to their major-junior teams in the Canadian Hockey League.

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Contact David Schoen at dschoen@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-5203. Follow @DavidSchoenLVRJ on Twitter.