Zach Hyman scored the third most goals in the regular season, finishing with 54, and continued to score at a torrid pace in the first game of the Stanley Cup Playoffs as the Edmonton Oilers defeated the Los Angeles Kings 7-4. Powered by his first career playoff hat trick, the Oilers earned their first Game 1 victory in nine attempts, last grabbing a 1-0 series lead back in 2017 against the Anaheim Ducks.
In 2022 and 2023, the Kings took Game 1 in their previous opening-round matchups with the Oilers. However, this year, the script has been flipped, as Hyman led Edmonton to victory with three goals while captain Connor McDavid set a career-high for points in a playoff game with five assists.
Once Hyman opened the scoring at 6:52 of the first period, the Oilers continued to rack up the chances, finishing the night with 45 shots on Cam Talbot. Although the Kings got two on the board in the second period, Leon Draisaitl’s powerplay goal at 1:08 of the third stood up as the game-winner.
Stuart Skinner picked up the win between the pipes, making 33 saves. Despite giving up four goals, he was solid in the net, easing away any doubts that he wasn’t ready for the grind of the Stanley Cup Playoffs. His counterpart, Talbot, had a rough night, finishing with a .864 save percentage, not having any answers for Hyman, McDavid, and the Oilers’ powerplay, which collected two goals.
After Hyman made it 1-0, trade deadline acquisition Adam Henrique gave the home team a 2-0 advantage at 9:36. Interestingly, it was the only goal out of the Oilers’ first five lamplighters that McDavid didn’t register a point since he set up Hyman for all three of his tallies and assisted on Ryan Nugent-Hopkins second period goal (8:24) and Draisaitl’s winner. Warren Foegele added an unassisted empty-net goal with just 26 seconds left.
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The underdog Kings, who the experts predict don’t stand a chance in the series, managed to keep things interesting with two goals in the middle frame from Mikey Anderson (10:56) and Adrian Kempe (17:56). Even though they were down by four in the final minutes, Pierre-Luc Debois got Los Angeles back on the scoresheet at 16:56 and Trevor Moore made it 6-4 at 18:49.
Game 2 will be on Wednesday night, with the puck drop at 10:00 p.m. ET.