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Kings 4, Oilers 7
It was a game of big numbers at Rogers Place which included 82 shots, 72 draws, 112 hits and 11 goals. Connor McDavid score 5 points, Zach Hyman a Evan Bouchard 4 each. Adam Henrique he scored his first second chance point in 12 years. And the Edmonton Oilers won the opening game of a playoff series on their home ice for the first time in 12,409 days.
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But they won, cruising to a 7-4 victory over the Los Angeles Kings to establish a 1-0 series lead in the 2024 edition of the seemingly annual opening round series between the two.
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It wasn’t always pretty, but many of the goals certainly were. The Oilers held the advantage in play, outscoring the Kings 45-37 with an 18-10 advantage in Grade A Shots as recorded by the Cult of Hockey (run an account). 8 of those Grade A shots came on a red-hot power play that produced 3 goals in a combined time of 4:50.
Player ratings
#2 Evan Bouchard, 7. Moved the puck well overall and had 4 secondary assists to show for it, not to mention a tertiary that doesn’t show up on the score sheet. But he was among the defensive culprits on two LA goals that cut the 4-0 lead in half before the end of the second period. More good than bad on the night. Grade A Hit Contributions (GAS): Equal Strength +3/-2, Special Teams +1/-0.
#5 Cody Ceci, 6. Played a rock solid defensive game, landed 5 hits and won the lion’s share of battles. Chased a couple of unlucky goals against in garbage time, and in the spotlight himself on 1 of them when his stick exploded making a typical DiD pass after facing a won neutral zone. His 19:00 led the team at even strength. GAS: ES +2/-3; ST +1/-0.
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#13 Mattias Janmark, 5. A classic Janmark game where not much happened during his 10 minutes of action, for or against. Tagged with an undeserved -1 on Ceci-stick-explodes goal. GAS: +0/-0; ST 0.
#14 Mattias Ekholm, 6. Solid with a couple of shaky moments. Did a couple of lunge stops on the same dangerous sequence. His neutral zone turnover led to a Viktor Arvidsson breakaway early in the second, then he couldn’t contain Adrian Kempe at 4-2. Delivered a great stretch pass to Hyman for a chance to break away. The D led with 2:00 on the penalty kill. GAS: ES +4/-2; ST 0.
#18 Zach Hyman, 9. All along from the start, driving hard to the net again and again. Score a goal in each period by getting into a dangerous position and converting McDavid’s pass from close range. Add basic assist on Henrique’s goal. It took goalkeeper intervention for another net drive gone wrong. Later he pulled a call the other way. Hit a post in a scramble. Robbed of Talbot’s best save of the game on the break away. He got hit on the continuation of that play and was in pain, but returned for another shift and seemed fine. He may have set a record for most hats on the ice for a hat trick. 9 shots on net to lead both teams. He also added 5 hits and was a central figure in the battle all night. GAS: ES +7/-1; ST+3/-0.
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#19 Adam Henrique, 7. His first playoff game in 6 years and his first playoff win in 12. He won a fight leading to the first Oilers goal, scored the second himself with a strong wrist shot from range, then earned an assist on the third. He made a big aerial deflection from Ceci’s outside shot. He took punishment. Among those beaten on Kings’ first goal. GAS: ES +4/-1; ST +1/-1.
#25 Nurse Darnell, 6. Played a solid 2-way game with 7 shot attempts, 2 blocks, and 6 hits. Won many battles along the way. Paste Kempe early in the game with an open ice breakthrough. Safe and sound behind his own blue line until late, when an ice pass caught his skate and found the net to make it 6-3. GAS: ES +0/-2; ST 0.
#27 Brett Kulak, 5. A low event game including no goals at either end of the sheet during its 16 minutes. GAS: ES +0/-2; ST 0.
#29 Leon Draisaitl, 8. He almost wrecked himself on his opening shift when he ran into a King and missed, but thankfully he survived. He did his best work on the power play, setting up RNH’s tally with a great pass and scoring the winning goal himself with a great shot. Also made a great pass to RNH at even strength 2-on-1 which was not converted. Strong defensively. He drew a penalty. Rock solid on the faceoff dot at 15/24=63%. 3 shots at one end, 2 blocks (!) at the other end. GAS: ES = 0/-0; ST +5/-0.
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#37 Warren Foegele, 6. Mash Drew Doughty with a great shot very early on. Played a simple, solid game. He scored the empty netter and ended the score line, after stealing the puck first in the neutral zone.
#39 Sam Carrick, 5. He played his first career playoff game at age 32 and got the job done. His line with Holloway and Janmark lost the possession battle but held their own on the score until the late game. He was tagged with -1 on the 4-2, but his “mistake” there was to do the job hjje was sent out to do and win a d-zone faceoff. 1 shot, 2 blocks, 4 hits, and 10/18=56% on the dot. GAS: +0/-0; ST 0.
#55 Dylan Holloway, 5. He singled in his second career playoff game. GAS: +0/-0; ST 0.
#71 Ryan McLeod, 6. Played a great defensive game between vets Kane and Perry. 2 takeaways, 2 shots blocked. GAS: ES +2/-0; ST 0.
#73 Vincent Desharnais, 6. Rock of Gibraltar on the blue, with 6 hits and 5 shot blocks. After receiving a nasty low bridge from Trevor Moore that left him in obvious pain as the second period drew to a close, but he returned in the third to finish the job. Best of all, the Oil scored the game winner on the resulting power play. GAS: +0/-1; ST 0.
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#74 Stu Skinner, 6. Very good in the first half of the game. He contributed to TSN’s Turning Point when he got a small piece of his pad on Viktor Arvidsson’s breakaway shot, with the Oilers then scoring on the follow-up. The game that could have been 2-1, instead was 3-0. The back half of the game didn’t go so well with 4 official GAs and a fifth part being gloved and correctly called back after a few nervous minutes. Had a little trouble with rebound control. 37 shots, 33 saves, .892 save percentage.
#90 Corey Perry, 5. Put the puck in good places, including on Kane’s stick for some great chances tight ends. 3 hits, 2 takeaways. GAS: ES +2/-0; ST 0.
#91 Evander Kane, 6. It was visible throughout, mostly in good ways. Fired 6 shots on net including a couple of powerful wristers. almost squeezing one through Talbot. Had a couple of issues stopping outside shots from the point. EDM led the way with 15:45 TOI at even strength. GAS: IS +3/-1.
#93 Ryan Nugent Hopkins, 6. Perfectly set up by Draisaitl for what appeared to be a wide open net, but the puck rolled off his stick. Made up for it a few minutes later with a strong goalmouth finish from another sweet feed from Draisaitl. 4 shots, 2 blocks, 2 hits, 1 takeaway, and a team-high 2:04 on the 2-for-2 penalty. GAS: ES +0/-0; ST +1/-0.
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#97 Connor McDavid, 9. He became just the 15th player in NHL history with 5 (or more) assists in a playoff game, joining the Oilers line of Wayne Gretzky (2x), Paul Coffey, Glenn Anderson and 10 others from other teams. 4 of them were main assists, including all 3 of Hyman’s tallies. Twice McDavid beat defenders with brilliant spin moves before serving. He pushed a bullet pass through the skates of Matt Roy for Hyman’s hat trick goal. 3 shots, 3 hits, and an uncounted pass. GAS: ES +3/-0; ST +6/-0.
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