Golden Knights-Seattle Kraken preview: Chandler Stephenson returns | Golden Knights

On By Littum

Goaltender Ilya Samsonov will start for the Golden Knights as they look for their seventh win in eight games on Saturday against the Seattle Kraken.

Samsonov will make his first appearance since Sunday in the Knights’ 3-2 win over the Minnesota Wild at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul. The 27-year-old netminder made 20 saves for his fourth win in five starts to improve to 7-3-1 on the season.

He will get the call against a Seattle team that has lost four of five and has eight goals in that span. Five of those came in a 5-1 win Dec. 12 against the Boston Bruins.

Former Knights center Chandler Stephenson will return to T-Mobile Arena for the first time since signing a seven-year deal with Seattle in the offseason.

Stephenson had 237 points in 327 games with the Knights and was selected as an All-Star in 2021-22.

“Hopefully he gets a good hand from the crowd here,” coach Bruce Cassidy said. “He had a lot of good years here and helped us win the Stanley Cup.”

The Knights will play a second straight game without left wing Ivan Barbashev and center Nicolas Roy due to upper-body injuries. They also make some changes to the lines.

Brett Howden will now be the left wing on center Tomas Hertl’s line with right wing Keegan Kolesar moving Tanner Pearson to William Karlsson’s line with right wing Victor Olofsson.

Cassidy goes with a fourth line that responded well when put together in Thursday’s 3-1 win over Vancouver. Tanner Laczynski will be at center, moving Cole Schwindt to left wing and Alexander Holtz to right.

“They’re a good team. They got a lot of good players and a lot of skill,” Olofsson said. “If we can shut down their top players and have a solid game defensively like we’ve had here the last few games, I think we have a good shot to win.”

Expected lineup

Pavel Dorofeyev – Jack Eichel – Mark Stone

Brett Howden – Tomas Hertl – Keegan Kolesar

Tanner Pearson — William Karlsson — Victor Olofsson

Cole Schwindt – Tanner Laczynski – Alexander Holtz

Brayden McNabb – Shea Theodore

Noah Hanifin – Alex Pietrangelo

Nic Hague — Zach Whitecloud

Ilya Samsonov

Contact Danny Webster at [email protected]. Follow @DannyWebster21 on X.