Draisaitl’s 2 goals lift the Oilers past the Ducks 4-1 to stave off elimination

EDMONTON, Alberta (AP) — Leon Draisaitl scored a pair of goals and Evan Bouchard chipped in with three assists as the Edmonton Oilers staved off elimination by beating the Anaheim Ducks 4-1 on Tuesday night. The Oilers now trail the best-of-seven Western Conference playoff series 3-2 with game 6 on Thursday night in Anaheim. Vasily Podkolzin and Zach Hyman also scored for the Oilers who had previously allowed six separate leads to slip away in the first four games of the series. Connor McDavid and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins each had a pair of assists. Edmonton is now 18-3 when scoring first in a game when facing elimination. Alex Killorn scored for the Ducks. Connor Ingram made 29 stops for Edmonton, while Ville Husso recorded 10 saves for Anaheim after coming in to relieve Lukas Dostal, who allowed three goals on nine shots. For the fifth straight game the Oilers struck first, scoring on the game’s first shot just 2:22 into the contest as Podkolzin beat Dostal high for his second of the postseason. Edmonton took a 2-0 lead 8:33 into the opening period as a point shot was deflected twice, the second time through Dostal’s legs by Hyman. The Oilers took a 3-0 lead just 1:14 later as Draisaitl tipped Bouchard's point shot in for his second of the playoffs. That spelled an early end of the night for Dostal. Anaheim got on the board on the power play 8:26 into the second period as Mason McTavish dropped it back to Killorn, who extended his points streak to four games with his third goal of the playoffs. Edmonton responded with a power-play goal a couple of minutes later on a one-timer by Draisaitl, who tied Wayne Gretzky for the most postseason power-play goals in franchise history at 23. Edmonton has played the most playoff games of any NHL team since 2022 with 80, two more than the , who beat the Oilers in the last two Stanley Cup finals before failing to qualify this season. Playing in his 80th career playoff game, Bouchard collected his 88th point, moving into a tie for third place for players through 80 games with Brian Leetch, behind only Bobby Orr (92) and Paul Coffey (92). McDavid (63 points) passed Adam Oates for the second-most points in NHL history when trailing in a playoff series. Only Gretzky (80) has more. \\_ AP NHL playoffs: and