In Edmonton, the Oilers were perhaps in a better frame of mind on Tuesday night, certainly more giving than they were in Los Angeles last week when they refused to surrender the game puck to the Kings after a loss. 
They were giving indeed Tuesday in their game with the Detroit Red Wings in the form of eight goals in an 8-4 thrashing of the Wings.
Connor McDavid kicked in six assists in the win.
“I thought we had a couple lucky ones,” McDavid said. “I think the first one was a little lucky. ‘Nuge’ makes a great play on one, Nuge makes a good play on a couple. I play with some good players, obviously, and tonight was a good night.”
Stuart Skinner made 34 saves in the win.
The Oilers improved to 31-17-1.
“I think his stats sheet says it all: Six assists, plus-6, no power-play time and he was skating,” Edmonton coach Kris Knoblauch said. “He was one of the few guys who was skating for a full 60 minutes, and the plays that he made tonight were pretty phenomenal.
“If he’s not on top of his game, we’re probably not winning that one.”
The game was a 3-3 tie after the first 40 minutes of play. The Oilers scored at will in the third period, posting five goals.
The Oilers took a 1-0 lead when Leon Draisaitl scored at 8:48 of the opening stanza.
Edmonton’s Cody Ceci pushed the lead to 2-0 at 11:05.
“I wasn’t sure. There were a couple of guys in front, so I kind of went and asked,” Ceci said. “It ended up being mine. … [McDavid] won us the game. He played unbelievable. I think he was a little mad that he got shut out last game (a 4-0 loss to the Los Angeles Kings on Saturday), and he showed it tonight. He came out with some fire and played unbelievable. I’ve never seen that before.”
Detroit replied with a power play strike by Alex DeBrincat at 15:39 to trim the deficit to 2-1.
Red Wings dropped to 27-19-6.
“I don’t know if it’s the same injury, but it’s a lower-body injury,” Detroit coach Derek Lalonde said. “Unfortunately, he hurt himself previous to the goal, hence he was not able to move laterally on the goal. That’s very unfortunate for him, especially since he’s fought really hard to get back to this point.”
In the middle frame, Evan Bouchard scored midway through the period to give the Oilers a 3-1 lead.
The Red Wings then replied with a pair of goals to get the game even.
Joe Veleno hit for a second power play strike for Detroit at 11:24 to drop the deficit to 3-2.
Patrick Kane hit at 14:30 on a deflection to knot the game, 3-3, headed to the third.
“The amount of odd-man rushes we gave up were the month of January all combined in one period,” Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch said. “So, we got a little bit better at that. Obviously, the goal scoring was there tonight, but the defensive details need to be better.”
The third period ice was tilted in the Oilers favor. Edmonton scored early and often.
Dylan Holloway scored with 44 seconds gone in the third for a 4-3 lead to the Oilers.
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins stretched the lead to 5-3 at 3:27 off a wrister.
Zach Hyman ballooned the lead to 6-3 at 12:55.
Evander Kane then added to the lead on an easy tap in at the crease just 46 seconds later for a 7-3 lead.
David Perron added a so what goal at 15:10 to make it 7-4.
“We just lost it in the third, which is really disappointing,” Detroit;s Moritz Seider said. “Up to that point, I thought we had the better chances, we were rolling and, in the end, it’s a devastating result with a lot of mistakes we have [to] correct. It’s still a long road trip (Detroit was playing the first of a four-game road trip) and hopefully we can flip the switch here pretty quick.
“When you make those kind of mistakes against the top players in the world, they make you pay for it. Definitely we learned our lesson today.”
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins potted one more in the onslaught at 17:49 for the 8-4 final count on the scoreboard.
Ville Husso got the start for his first game since returning from an injury.
He left the ice ahead of the midway point of the first period with another injury. He had made six saves, yielding one goal.
Alex Lyon made 22 saves, surrendering seven goals in relief.
“Unfortunately, unlike our previous six weeks where we had outstanding goaltending, that didn’t bail us out tonight,” Lalonde said. “It’s going to be a frustrating game to watch back, because we did a lot of good things to get a game like that to 3-3. To let it slip away, it’s a little frustrating. The bottom line is too much easy offense, not a lot of it, but too much easy offense for a team that doesn’t need easy offense
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