In Edmonton, the Oilers’ Connor McDavid netted his first NHL post season hat trick as Edmonton evened their series with the Chicago Blackhawks, 1-1, in a 6-3 victory.
“You never plan to score on the first shift, but we wanted to have a good start and make sure we were in their zone and we found a way to get one, and that was good,” McDavid said. “Our work ethic, [we] kept it very simple. It sounds all very cliché but it’s all stuff we didn’t do in Game 1 (a 6-4 loss on Saturday), we did tonight and it was good.”
Mikko Koskinen made 23 saves to back up the offense for the win.
“McDavid’s obviously a focus for us, and we’re not making things hard enough on them offensively, then we take penalties, and you know what happens on the power play,” the Blackhawks’ Jonathan Toews said. “A guy like McDavid’s going to make you pay. We know what we’re going to get out of him every game, so we have to be better on him.”
McDavid posted the first two goals of the game for a 2-0 Oilers lead.
“Those first two goals are both really strong goals, sends a really strong message to our team that he was here to play,” Oilers coach Dave Tippett said. “Tonight, we came out with determination. Connor was a big part of that, showing the way early. Our whole group really played with a mindset that we weren’t going to lose tonight … When we play like that, we’ll give ourselves a chance every night.”
Patrick Kane, Olli Maatta and Slater Koekkoek scored for the Hawks who had tied the game, 3-3.
“We gave them too many chances,” Kane said. “They have a lot of offensive players who will capitalize. We’ll try to be better defensively. This is what’s fun about the playoffs, these highs and lows. We’re happy we got the opportunity here, so I think we’ll bounce back and have a better game in Game 3.”
Tyler Ennis,Alex Chiasson and James Neal added single markers for Edmonton.
“I think we were embarrassed after Game 1. We knew what we needed to do, and we came out played well,” Ennis said. “Every guy on the team played well tonight.”
[WATCH: All Blackhawks vs. Oilers highlights]
Corey Crawford made 29 saves in the loss.
“It was an opportunity to find our way more into the game,” Chicago coach Jeremy Colliton said. “We had some chances, we didn’t score. They got a couple of saves, they blocked a couple shots. We’ll look at it and adjust.”
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