Vegas Golden Knights win season opener in new coach Ryan Craig's NHL debut

The Vegas Golden Knights opened their 2026-27 season with a 5-2 win over the Chicago Blackhawks on Tuesday night at T-Mobile Arena, handing new head coach Ryan Craig a victory in his first game behind an NHL bench. The result, part of the five-city slate that opened the league's new season, also produced a milestone for Vegas alternate captain Jack Eichel, who recorded a goal and two assists to reach 700 career points.

Craig, promoted in June from the Golden Knights' American Hockey League affiliate, became the fifth head coach in the franchise's ten-year history. He is also the third man to run the Vegas bench in just over three months, following a coaching carousel set off by a run to the Stanley Cup Final that still ended in disappointment.

How the game unfolded

Victor Olofsson opened the scoring on a first-period power play, and rookie forward Trevor Connelly doubled the lead minutes later with the first goal of his NHL career, making him the second-youngest player to score in a debut in franchise history. Chicago's Jordan Greenway cut the margin to one in the second period before Eichel restored the two-goal cushion, and Patrick Kane answered with an unassisted goal in the third to make it a one-goal game. Vegas pulled away from there.

• 1st period: Olofsson (power play) — Vegas 1-0; Connelly — Vegas 2-0
• 2nd period: Greenway (Chicago) — Vegas 2-1; Eichel — Vegas 3-1
• 3rd period: Kane, unassisted (Chicago) — Vegas 3-2; Hanifin — Vegas 4-2; Stone, empty net — Vegas 5-2 final

Noah Hanifin's goal in the third period put the outcome out of reach, and Mark Stone added an empty-net goal in the closing minutes. Vegas goaltender Carter Hart made 24 saves, while Chicago's Spencer Knight stopped 32 shots in a losing effort, according to the team's official recap of the game. Announced attendance at T-Mobile Arena was 17,838.

Connelly's goal carried its own significance. A first-round pick in the 2023 NHL Draft who spent the past two seasons developing in the minors, the young winger made the opening-night roster out of training camp and scored in his first NHL game, becoming the second-youngest player to do so in franchise history.

From Henderson to the NHL bench

Craig, a native of Abbotsford, British Columbia, spent six seasons as a Golden Knights assistant coach from 2017 to 2023, a stretch that included the franchise's first Stanley Cup championship under Bruce Cassidy. He then spent three seasons as head coach of the Henderson Silver Knights, Vegas's AHL affiliate, leading the club to a franchise-record 39 wins and 90 points in 2025-26. Vegas general manager Kelly McCrimmon, who has known Craig since their days together with the Brandon Wheat Kings of the Western Hockey League, promoted him to head coach on June 18. Before his coaching career, Craig played 198 NHL games with the Tampa Bay Lightning, Pittsburgh Penguins and Columbus Blue Jackets.

A turbulent year behind the Vegas bench

Craig's hiring followed one of the stranger coaching sequences in recent NHL memory. Vegas fired Cassidy in March 2026 and replaced him with John Tortorella, who guided the team to a 7-0-1 finish to the regular season and an improbable run to the Stanley Cup Final. That run ended in June when the Golden Knights were shut out 3-0 at home in Game 6, as the Carolina Hurricanes won their first championship since 2006. Two days later, the organization announced Tortorella would not return, closing out a tenure of barely three months that nonetheless reached the final round of the playoffs.

The quick pivot left Vegas searching for its fourth coach since 2022, and the front office ultimately turned to the candidate already inside the building. Craig takes over a roster that has reached the Cup Final three times in franchise history and is widely regarded as a contender again this season.

A milestone night for Eichel

Eichel's three-point performance was his first of the season and pushed his career total to 701 points, according to NHL.com's statistics page for the Vegas center. The feat made him the ninth American-born player in league history to reach 700 points in fewer than 700 career games, a group that includes some of the most productive scorers the country has produced. Eichel, who has served as a Vegas alternate captain since arriving from Buffalo in 2021, has been the engine of the team's top line for five seasons.

Reaction and what comes next

Craig has said little publicly about strategy since being hired, preferring instead to describe the opportunity in personal terms. When the Golden Knights introduced him in June, he spoke about the chance to lead the only NHL organization he has worked for as a coach.

"I'm ready for this opportunity. I'm grateful for it. I'm ready to get to work. I feel that we have a very, very good hockey team and a very, very good city," Craig said at his introductory press conference.

Vegas's season opener was also notable for what it did not include: any drama. Craig's team led for all but a few minutes of the game, a contrast to the uncertainty that has surrounded the franchise's coaching position since Cassidy's dismissal. The win, as one Las Vegas station framed it, gave the new coach exactly the start he needed.

For Chicago, the loss opens a season in which the Blackhawks are again expected to lean on a young core alongside veterans such as Kane, who scored Chicago's second goal. Both teams continue their season schedules this week, with Vegas looking to build on its opening win and Chicago looking for its first victory of the new season.