LAS VEGAS — What appeared to be another slow start became another comeback win for the Edmonton Oilers in the postseason.
Allowing two goals within the first 10 minutes created the illusion that the Oilers could once again fall to open a series. Instead? They scored four unanswered goals in a 4-2 win Tuesday against the Vegas Golden Knights in the Western Conference semifinals at T-Mobile Arena.
For the Oilers, not only was their fifth consecutive comeback win this postseason. But was also the first time in nearly a full calendar year they won the first game of a series.
“I mean, you don’t want to be down in five games,” Oilers forward Zach Hyman said of his team’s comeback streak. “Again, we have the experience that we can come back and fight our way out of it. Yeah, you have to have that belief in your group when you are down and come back to win five in a row like that.”
Edmonton’s comeback was in lieu of a first period that saw Ryan Nugent-Hopkins receive a double minor for high-sticking that led to Vegas captain Mark Stone scoring only 39 seconds into the power play for a 1-0 lead. Stone doubled that lead with 10:57 remaining in the first when he received a pass from Jack Eichel that saw him create space by deking a defender before firing a shot past Calvin Pickard for a 2-0 advantage.
That’s when Game 1 became something of a jarring juxtaposition for the Golden Knights in that they went from scoring a pair of quick goals to gradually watching the Oilers plot their way toward taking the series lead.
It started when veteran Oilers superstar duo Leon Draisaitl and Connor McDavid played a pair off cross-ice passes with the latter finding veteran forward Corey Perry for goal that trimmed the lead to 2-1 with 3:34 remaining.
“It was kind of a hectic start,” Perry said. “We had the four-minute penalty early. They found a bounce and it went in the net. But I think after that we settled in and played our style of game. It’s great that we came back but it’d be nice to get on the other side of things and push forward with the lead.”
Scoring three goals in the third period is how the Oilers closed out Game 1. But what they did in the second period, however, is what placed them in a position to win their first Game 1 since May 23 when they opened the Western Conference finals over the Dallas Stars with a double-overtime victory.
The Oilers went from allowing 10 shots in the first period to only allowing one in the second. Part of the formula for how the defending Western Conference champions are launching a bid for another Stanley Cup finals goes back to how their defensive structure was one of the most consistent schemes in the NHL in the regular season.
It was evident a second period that saw the Oilers forecheck so aggressively that there were times in which the Golden Knights couldn’t even gather the puck let alone get off a shot. Yet what might have been a more damning sign of the Oilers’ defensive game plan was the alterations that Golden Knights coach Bruce Cassidy made that didn’t work in the second period.
“In the second period, we got caught in the wrong end of the momentum swing,” said Cassidy, who was visibly frustrated from the Golden Knights’ bench. “Then you’re always getting it out, changing. We never got any sustained o-zone pressure. We couldn’t get an opportunity to wear them down that way.”
Cassidy also said that the Oilers were also able to get two power plays while adding, “they iced it five times and they didn’t call icing” as it relates to pinning the Oilers in their zone.
The Oilers had so much control in the second period that they had a shot-share of 62% while limiting the Golden Knights to zero high-danger scoring chances, according to Natural Stat Trick.
It wasn’t like the third was any better for the Golden Knights, either. They only had six shots and one high-danger scoring chance in the final frame.
“I think our forecheck but they’re going to get out of the zone some time,” Oilers defenseman John Klingberg said. “I think we had good reloads from the forwards and that helped the D keep a good gap. When you control the puck like that in the second period, you continue a lot of energy.”
Getting one shot on goal in the second was further compounded by Draisaitl scoring the game-tying goal just 57 seconds into the third. Nearly four minutes later, Hyman scored what proved to be the game-winning goal with Connor Brown scoring with less than two minutes remaining.
And just like that? The Oilers now take a 1-0 series lead into Game 2 on Thursday at T-Mobile Arena.
Opening the playoffs with consecutive losses against the Los Angeles Kings created questions about if the Oilers would be knocked out in the quarterfinal round after reaching the Stanley Cup finals last season.
They appeared to be heading toward a third consecutive loss before they broke out to score four straight goals in Game 3. It happened again when they came back from two goals in Game 4 to win in overtime before they closed out the series in five games to eliminate the Kings for a fourth straight postseason.
Now they’ll seek to advance to the Western Conference finals for a second straight season while looking to overcome what happened in 2023 when they lost to the Golden Knights in six games in the semifinal round.
Edmonton also lost the first game of that series which would see Vegas reach the conference finals en route to winning the franchise’s first Stanley Cup.
“I think we’re a patient group, we’re a veteran team,” Klingberg said. “The guys here have been playing in a lot of playoffs [games] throughout the years, so they know what it takes. It’s just stick to our game and take it game-by-game.”