Knights celebrate Max Pacioretty’s birthday with arcade trip

GLENDALE, Ariz. — There may not have been party hats, but Golden Knights forward Max Pacioretty celebrated his 30th birthday on Tuesday night the same way many 8-year-olds might dream.

He played the arcade games at Dave & Buster’s with NHL players.

“(Alex) Tuch beat me in Guitar Hero and (Malcolm Subban) beat me in Basketball Connect 4,” Pacioretty said with a laugh. “It was definitely in the top 30 birthdays of my life.”

The forward’s birthday fell on the Knights’ only off day on a three-game road trip and allowed a little time for frivolity before they faced the Coyotes on Wednesday night.

Pacioretty scored in each of the first two games on the road trip, though he was in no mood to enjoy Monday night’s goal since it came late in a blowout loss to Calgary.

“That goal didn’t mean anything, but I like the way my game’s been trending since I came back from injury,” he said. “I think our line has created some good chemistry and more than production, I like the chances that we’ve gotten. We’ve gotten opportunities to be the difference and now we want to be the difference.”

Pacioretty has 226 goals in 626 career games. He doesn’t see his 30th birthday as some sort of career milestone.

“I hope I age like a fine wine, but we’ll see if it happens,” he said. “I think in a good environment, it doesn’t matter how old you are, I think you mentally feel good every day. This is a good environment. We just want to start winning some more game and have some more fun.”

He was talking about the Knights, not his Dave & Buster’s struggles.

Turkey time

American Thanksgiving is seen as an unofficial measuring stick in NHL circles, when teams forge identities and playoff possibilities begin to come into focus.

The Knights hope that’s not the case, but the numbers say teams in a playoff position at this point have a pretty good chance to make the postseason, according to numbers compiled by Sirius XM’s NHL crew.

In three of the last five years, 13 of the 16 teams sitting in a playoff spot on the fourth Thursday of November ended up qualifying for the playoffs.

Twelve of the 16 made it in 2015-16 and 11 qualified last season.

The Knights were three points out of a playoff spot entering Wednesday night’s game.

Knights rebrand ticket exchange

Team president Kerry Bubolz announced the launch of a rebranded ticket resale marketplace.

VGK Ticket Exchange, supported by Flash Seats, provides a secure resale platform for buying, selling and transferring tickets.

The site is live at vgkticketexchange.com or can be accessed through the team’s homepage.

More Golden Knights: Follow online at reviewjournal.com/GoldenKnights and @HockeyinVegas on Twitter.

Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com or 702-277-8028. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on Twitter.