In Edmonton, Phillip Danault hit for the go-ahead goal in the the 15th minute of the third period to send the Los Angeles Kings to a 4-3 win over the Oilers on Monday night, the win gives the Kings a 1-0 series lead.
“I think obviously no matter how it’s ending, if you have one more goal, that’s the best ending,” Danault said. “We stuck with it. They came back in the game and they had a good PP. I think we showed the character again tonight and we stuck with it and big win.”
The goal came off a turnover by Oilers goalie Mike Smith.
“I was just trying to make something happen; obviously trying to do too much there,” Smith said. “In a tight game like that you can’t afford to make mistakes like that. It ended up costing us the game. Obviously disappointed, but it’s one game and we move on.”
Jonathan Quick made 36 saves in the LA win.
Trevor Moore and Alex Iafallo scored to give the Kings an early 2-0 lead.
“I thought we did a good job, kind of like we have all year, just leaning on our leadership,” Moore said. “You know those guys are going to have pushes. With two of the best players in the world, they’re going to have their moments. I thought ‘Quicky’ made huge saves when we needed them and did a good job.”
Connor McDavid scored late in the first period to cut the LA lead in half, and Kailer Yamamoto (power play) scored in the second period to get the Oilers even at 2-2.
“There’s lots of emotion with fans back in the building and I thought we just didn’t handle it all that well; they got the jump on us,” McDavid said. “I thought we did a great job of getting ourselves back in the game and giving ourselves a chance. Ultimately it’s one bounce. We didn’t have a great start. We gave up a few chances and found ourselves down by two. It wasn’t a good enough start in our home building. It’s something to work on.”
LA reclaimed the lead off a goal from Brendan Lemieux, at 3-2.
“I thought we did the things we needed to do for the most part,” Kings coach Todd McLellan said. “We’ve used the word ‘identity’ a lot during the year and we played to that again. It’s what gives us a chance.”
Leon Draisaitl tied the game, 3-3,his goal came off the power late in the middle frame.
“I didn’t love the way we started the game, obviously, we gave up a chance off a neutral zone face-off we took an early penalty, those type of things that allowed them to feel good at the start of the game,” Oilers coach Jay Woodcroft said. “I thought we worked our way into things and found a way to compete in the end it came down to an error in the third period and they capitalized on it.”
Smith made 31 saves in the loss.
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