Marc-Andre Fleury made 19 saves to register his sixth shutout of the season as the visiting Vegas Golden Knights kept alive their hopes for a West Division title and Presidents’ Trophy with a 6-0 victory over the San Jose Sharks on Wednesday night in the regular-season finale for both teams.
Fleury also moved into a tie for 14th place on the NHL’s all-time shutouts list with Roy Worters with the 67th of his career while also extending his personal win streak to nine in a row.
Dylan Sikura scored twice, Jonathan Marchessault and William Carrier each had a goal and an assist and Alex Pietrangelo and Keegan Kolesar also scored goals for Vegas (40-14-2, 82 points), which leads Colorado (38-13-4, 80 points) by two points.
However, the Avalanche, by virtue of the more-regulation-wins tiebreaker, can claim the West crown and Presidents’ Trophy with a victory of any kind – regulation, overtime or shootout – over the visiting Los Angeles Kings in their regular-season finale last night.
Reilly Smith added two assists for the Golden Knights, who won all eight meetings (8-0-0) against San Jose this season.
Alexei Melnichuk, making just his second career NHL start, made 38 saves for the Sharks, who finished with a 21-28-7 record and 49 points and missed the playoffs for the second straight year, losing 14 of their final 17 games in the process.
Vegas, looking like a team that still had plenty to play for against a team looking that didn’t, jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first 7:48.
Pietrangelo, left alone in the slot, backhanded in a loose puck for his seventh goal of the season to make it 1-0, and Kolesar followed with his third of the season, tucking in a loose puck inside the right post.
Carrier made it 3-0 at the 3:05 mark of the second period with his sixth goal of the season, trickling in a rebound of a Alex Tuch shot over Melnichuk’s shoulder. Marchessault followed four minutes later with his 18 th on a wrist shot from the right circle as the Golden Knights outshot the Sharks, 30-8, in the first 30 minutes.
Sikura then increased the lead to 6-0 the third period with the second and third goals of his career and first two with Vegas, both on medium-range wrist shots past Melnichuk’s glove side. It marked an NHL-best 20th game this season with at least five goals for the Golden Knights.

Compher nets hat-trick, Avs keep first-place hopes alive
JT Compher tallied his first career hat-trick and the Colorado Avalanche inched closer to securing the top seed in the West Division with a 6-0 win against the Los Angeles Kings in Denver on Wednesday night. Colorado (38-13-4, 80 points) can secure first place in the West with a win against the visiting Kings last night in the regular-season finale for both teams.
“Compher had himself a night and it turned out to be a good victory for us,” Avalanche coach Jared Bednar said. “We’ll put it away and move on for tomorrow.”
Gabriel Landeskog had a goal and an assist, Mikko Rantanen had three assists, and Philipp Grubauer made 18 saves for his seventh shutout of the season, tying Semyon Varlamov of the New York Islanders for the NHL lead.
Calvin Petersen made 31 saves for the Kings (21-27-7, 49 points) in their most one-sided loss since an 8-2 defeat to the Vancouver Canucks on October 9, 2019. The Avalanche scored three goals late in the first period and three more in the second to build a 6-0 lead.
Joonas Donskoi scored 15 seconds into a power play to give Colorado a 1-0 lead at 14:43 of the first.
Pierre-Edouard Bellemare pushed a loose puck through the pads of Petersen to make it 2-0 at 16:02, and Compher scored with 45 seconds left in the period for a 3-0 lead.
Defenseman Sean Walker hit the crossbar at 17:05 of the first period, but the Kings did not have a shot on goal the first 18:39. Compher scored his second goal at 4:16 of the second period to stretch the lead to 4-0.
Landeskog scored his 20th goal of the season at 10:03 to make it 5-0, and Compher completed his hat trick when the 26-year-old scored at 11:47 for the game’s final goal. Compher has 10 goals, putting him in double figures for a fourth straight season.
Colorado played without Nathan MacKinnon, who leads the Avalanche with 65 points. He was injured against the Vegas Golden Knights on Monday and will also miss Thursday’s game against the Kings.
He’s expected to be ready for the Stanley Cup playoffs.

Results
Golden Knights    6-0    Sharks
Avalanche    6-0    Kings
Blues    4-0    Wild
Oilers    4-3    Canadiens
Senators    4-3    Maple Leafs