Zach Hyman scored 10:39 into overtime to give the Edmonton Oilers a come-from-behind 5-4 win over the Los Angeles Kings Sunday night.
“Three overtime games and then the other one was tight down to the wire,” Hyman said after the game. “Not much space. Obviously two good teams. Two good power-plays too; there was a lot of special teams goals. It’s what was to be expected going in I think. Everybody thought this was going to be a tough series, nobody thought it was going to be an easy one and now it’s a best of three.”
The best-of-seven series is tied 2-2.
The Kings took the lead halfway through the first when Gabriel Vilardi chopped a rebound past Stuart Skinner. Less than a minute later, Evander Kane had a glorious chance in front off a Kings giveaway, but Joonas Korpisalo came up with a massive save.
Late in the first, Viktor Arvidsson spun around Vincent Desharnais, stormed in, and fired shot through Skinner to make it 2-0. Only 1:23 later, Anze Kopitar scored on the power play.
“At the end of it we were down 3-0 and that was probably our worst period of the series — it was — in a series where we haven’t given up a whole heck of a lot,” Oilers head coach Jay Woodcroft said. “So, for us to kind of regroup and get things back on the rails it started with one and we built it from there.”
Jack Campbell replaced Skinner to start the second period, making his first appearance since April 5.
The Oilers finally broke through when Evan Bouchard pounded home a power play goal five minutes into the second. Leon Draisaitl pulled the Oilers within one halfway through the period, popping in a pass from Connor McDavid for his fourth of the post-season. Draisaitl tied it on the power play with 10.5 ticks to go in the session.
Matt Roy got in behind the defence and beat Campbell to make it 4-3 Kings 4:28 into the third. Campbell kept the Oilers alive by stopping Arvidsson on a breakaway with 5:46 remaining. Evander Kane sniped his second of the series to even it 4-4 with 3:02 left.
The Oilers had a power play in overtime after Adrian Kempe was called for cross-checking Evan Bouchard, but they couldn’t cash in.
Hyman took a long pass from Bouchard and cut in down the right wing. His wrister eluded Korpisalo to end the game.
Campbell stopped 27 shots. Korpisalo made 35 stops.
“I think we’ve been battling hard like that all year and faced some adversity and you know they came out hot in the first, but nobody got down, we came out and just worked hard all night and got a big goal against a good team in overtime,” Campbell said.
Game five is Tuesday at Rogers Place (630 CHED, Face-off Show at 5:30 p.m., game at 7:30 p.m.)
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