One year removed from struggles in Texas, Maxime Lagace has career-best performance against Dallas

DALLAS — Roughly a year ago Maxime Lagace’s NHL career nearly fizzled out completely.

Then playing for the Texas Stars in the AHL the goalie lost his focus. Typically a composed, strong-willed goalie, something went wrong between the ears and Lagace couldn’t stop the puck at a reasonable rate.

“I wasn’t good enough,” Lagace said.

Things snowballed behind a struggling defense, and by the end of the season Lagace and his .883 AHL save percentage was discarded by the Dallas Stars and he wasn’t qualified as a restricted free agent.

“That was tough, I didn’t have my focus anymore and I just couldn’t get things back together,” Lagace said. “I would play well for short stretches, but than something would go wrong. I needed to be better, I knew that, I just didn’t stop the puck and I let my team down.”

Because of his performance Lagace didn’t have many options in free agency. Lagace leaves all contract negotiations to his agent, so there might have been other minor-league or AHL offers, but Vegas was the only opportunity the goalie knew about.

“(Goalie coach David) Prior had seen me play and was willing to give me a chance,” Lagace said. “I think he used his power to get me the offer. And we were happy to take it, because I don’t know what else would have been there.”

That leap of faith by Prior somehow turned into Lagace’s first NHL opportunity as the Vegas Golden Knights had a parade of injuries in goal and by Halloween he was already the fourth goalie to start a game for the expansion team.

On Saturday the goalie had his finest performance as an NHLer and turned away 36 shots in a 5-3 win against his former franchise. It was a chance to get some retribution against the Stars for not signing him and a chance to impress his dad, who was in attendance as part of the Golden Knights dad’s trip.

“I was a bit nervous for this one,” Lagace said. “I know my dad isn’t very emotional, so he was probably really quiet up there, but was probably really excited for me inside.”

Lagace was at his best in the third period and made 15 saves on 16 shots. He made sprawling stops on Antoine Roussel and Tyler Seguin when it was a one-goal game, and didn’t break when Dallas had a late power play.

And to think it may have been his final NHL game this season.

Marc-Andre Fleury is expected to make his return early next week after missing much of the season with a concussion. The Golden Knights have also been more than pleased with Malcolm Subban and his 2.33 goals against average and .924 save percentage.

Lagace was asked about that multiple times after the game, perhaps a downer after career-best performance. But the goalie handled it well, he dug into his bag of cliches — he’s taking it game-by-game — and he understands the situation.

After the rest of the media scrum parted, Lagace expanded a bit more.

“In the past something like that, maybe those questions, would bother me,” he said. “Like a year ago, I think I thought about too many outside things. I know (Fleury) is going to be back soon, but I also know I’ve proven something with this game tonight.”

And we’re talking about a goalie that was nearly sent to the Southern Professional Hockey — the bottom tier of pro hockey in North America — League during the 2014-15 season. For someone who is still only 24, Lagace is a veteran in the career resurgence field.

“It’s been fun, I’ve proven a lot of people wrong, and I think I have to continue doing that,” Lagace said. “This was big tonight, but I know I’ll have to be just as good the next chance I get.”