In Edmonton, the Oilers scored the five goals of the game on Wednesday night as they throttled the visiting Carolina Hurricanes, 6-1.
Zach Hyman hit for a hat trick in the win.
“I try to get better every year,” Hyman said. “It’s pretty simple but just try to work on things that I need to work on and … yeah I play with pretty good players, too. Connor [McDavid] set me up pretty nicely for the third one, and then [Ryan Nugent-Hopkins] gave me a nice play for the second one, so, you have to have linemates to be able to produce, and I’m fortunate to play with two of the best.”
Edmonton moved to 10-12-1.
Stuart Skinner made 39 saves in the win.
Edmonton took a 2-0 lead with 41 seconds gone in the game.
Ryan McLeod started the rout with a goal at 28 seconds for a 1-0 lead.
Mattias Ekholm followed that up just 13 seconds later for a 2-0 advantage.
“It was just a bad game from start to finish. We didn’t have anything going,” Hurricanes coach Rod Brind’Amour said. “You get in a hole like that right off the bat, that’s certainly not how you want to start a game. I haven’t seen a game like that out of us, so I’m a little bit at a loss for words.
“It’s not acceptable, not for sure. And our top guys especially have to show up more. You could definitely see their top guys out there, so we have to be better.”
Hyman then added a double in the first period to balloon the advantage out to 4-0 after the first 20 minutes.
Hyman scored at 5:46, and again at 14:03 for the 4-0 lead.
“I thought McLeod’s line started the game off with a statement, and I thought they were amazing the whole game,” Hyman said. “So, that really gets the team started, a goal on the first shift. And then obviously we followed up with another one, and then you’re up 2-0 before you blink. So, that makes the game a lot easier.”
Warren Foegele scored at 2:49 of the middle frame to push the lead out to 5-0 headed to the third.
“That is just a good play that you try to make every game whether you are scoring or not,” the Oilers’ Matias Janmark (three assists) said. “The fact that it ends up as an apple is a plus. I just try to play the same way every night and then some nights, I could probably play this game 100 times and I wouldn’t have three points on the night, but you have to play the same way no matter what.”
Jordan Staal was the lone striker for the Canes, his third period goal stopp the Oilers run to make it 5-1.
“It’s wasn’t pretty the whole game, kind of more embarrassing really,” Staal said. “Good thing we play tomorrow (at the Calgary Flames), I wouldn’t want to sit on that one for too long.
“They got two goals in the first minute. It’s tough to come back in this league in general. They were fresh and ready to go and we were slow and not finding anything that we do, so that’s what it’s going to look like.”
Carolina dropped to 14-10-1 off their second straight loss.
Midway through the third period, Hyman collected his hats with a strike for the 6-1 final count.
“He plays the right way, he doesn’t take shortcuts,” Edmonton coach Kris Knoblauch said of Hyman. “A lot of credit should be given to his linemates and the players that he’s playing with … but he’s finding ways to score goals, and it’s nice to see.
Use CodePHN15 The death of the Oilers’ season was greatly exaggerated?
Pyotr Kochetkov got the start, and made three saves, yielding three goals before getting the hook in the first period.
Antti Raanta made 25 saves in a mop up role.
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