{"id":564658,"date":"2026-03-27T16:16:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T16:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/564658\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T16:16:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T16:16:10","slug":"oilers-beat-golden-knights-in-ot-as-winning-elements-begin-to-arrive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/564658\/","title":{"rendered":"Oilers beat Golden Knights in OT as winning elements begin to arrive"},"content":{"rendered":"

Slowly, and we\u2019re not yet ready to say surely, all the elements of a good hockey team are beginning to arrive for the\u00a0Edmonton Oilers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

With six wins and 13 points in their past 10 games \u2014 and a couple of losses that you can live with \u2014 the game Northern Alberta has waited all season for is emerging like a springtime perennial, a solid nine games and three weeks before the first playoff game.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been only two games,\u201d cautioned Mattias Ekholm after Edmonton capped a perfect two-game road trip with a 4-3 overtime win at Vegas, \u201cbut I think that there\u2019s been a trend in the last 10 that the wins we\u2019ve gotten haven\u2019t been lucky. They\u2019ve been well earned.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re getting solid goaltending. The D pairs are gelling, all three of them. Our lines are coming together and we know more what we\u2019re supposed to do out there. We look more like a machine that is maybe a little bit more well-oiled. A little more well-working.\u201d<\/p>\n

On a steamy Thursday night just off The Strip, Edmonton led by a goal three separate times over Vegas. The Golden Knights have trailed more minutes this season than any other NHL club, and never led for a second Thursday.<\/p>\n

In the end, however, there were two key moments that allowed for\u00a0Evan Bouchard<\/a>\u2019s eventual overtime winner:<\/p>\n

After ten-and-a-half minutes without a shot, Connor Ingram robbed a wide-open Noah Hanifin with a blocker save with 3:00 to play, to get his team to OT. There, with Zach Hyman in the penalty box, the Oilers penalty killing unit of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Darnell Nurse and Connor Murphy gutted out the entire two minutes of a four-on-three, keeping the game alive for Bouchard to win it on the ensuing shift.<\/p>\n

Bouchard\u2019s bullet wrister went top cheese, his 20th goal of the season. He had a five-point road trip (1-4-5) and went plus-6 in Vegas and Utah, passing Kevin Lowe on the Oilers goal scoring list among D-men while becoming just the fourth Oilers defenceman to post a 20-goal season (Paul Coffey, Sheldon Souray and Charlie Huddy).<\/p>\n

But the penalty kill was what got the biggest raves post-game.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s just three guys getting it done. Nose down, going to work,\u201d marvelled Ingram, who was excellent in this one as well. \u201cThese guys were out there for two full minutes and you couldn\u2019t really tell. That\u2019s something you can\u2019t coach, you can\u2019t teach. Just three vets who know how to go to work and get the job done.\u201d<\/p>\n

This was Edmonton\u2019s fifth consecutive win at T-Mobile Arena, and eighth in their past 11 regular-season visits. They\u2019ve also won four of the past six playoff games here, and with a Round 1 series between these teams more than likely, you\u2019d think that would be a concern for Vegas head coach Bruce Cassidy.<\/p>\n

But he\u2019s got bigger fish to fry these days.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re just trying to\u2026 get in. It\u2019s been a battle for us since the Olympic break,\u201d admitted Cassidy, whose team has four wins in its last 15 games.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf it is Edmonton (in Round 1), I\u2019ll say, \u2018Yes.\u2019 But that\u2019s the furthest thing from my mind right now. We\u2019ve got other things to take care of.\u201d<\/p>\n

You can\u2019t say Vegas doesn\u2019t have time to turn its season around. Heck, the Oilers waited until about Game 65 before they hunkered down.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a great road trip. Two massive wins against two potential playoff opponents,\u201d said Zach Hyman, who hit the 30-goal mark for the third time in five seasons as an Oiler. The other two years he had 27 goals, a free agent signing that just keeps on giving in Edmonton.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have to string more wins together before we start pump ourselves up,\u201d Hyman said, \u201cbut every year everybody doubts what we can do. We have the team that, when we commit to playing the right way, it\u2019s hard to score against us.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s hard to play against a team that defends and on the other side we have guys who can break a game open.\u201d<\/p>\n

A power play that has not scored in four games is now 1-for-11 since Leon Draisaitl was injured.<\/p>\n

With Draisaitl\u2019s stature as an annual 50-goal centreman, and the power play good for one a night when he\u2019s on it, it\u2019s fair to say that losing Draisaitl costs Edmonton a goal per game. But rather than just trying to score their way out of that problem, Draisaitl\u2019s absence has been a catalyst to play a stingier defensive game.<\/p>\n

\u201cSometimes, when you lose one of your top players, it just allows everyone to step up to their game and play a little differently,\u201d Knoblauch said. \u201cObviously we miss Leon, and we can\u2019t wait to have him back. But our team\u2019s done a pretty good job of rising to the occasion.\u201d<\/p>\n

A head coach who has been asking his team for some focus for most of 60-some games can finally see a product he can win with. If the Oilers have finally found their traction, after about 10 false starts this season \u2014 and when Draisaitl returns \u2014 teams won\u2019t be lining up to face them in Round 1.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re looking more like we\u2019re playing a playoff game. Like things matter,\u201d Knoblauch said. \u201cAttention to detail \u2014 we\u2019re simplifying our game. Yeah, it\u2019s nice to see. Everyone seems like they\u2019re dialled in.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Slowly, and we\u2019re not yet ready to say surely, all the elements of a good hockey team are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":564659,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194294],"tags":[49,48,23752],"class_list":{"0":"post-564658","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-edmonton","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-edmonton"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564658","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=564658"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564658\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/564659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=564658"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=564658"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=564658"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}