Out of Town Scoreboard: Oilers within reach of top spot in the Pacific Division after Golden Knights shootout loss

After a Friday with nothing on the schedule, all 32 NHL teams were in action on Saturday night. Let’s go through what happened and what’s up next…

The Oilers got the job done against the basement-dwelling Sharks on Saturday afternoon as they rolled into San Jose and cruised to a 6-1 win. The win was Edmonton’s seventh in a row, which is their longest winning streak of the season. They haven’t lost a game in regulation since all the way back on March 11 against the Toronto Maple Leafs.

The Golden Knights weren’t able to keep pace with the Oilers as they got dropped by the Dallas Stars in a shootout on Saturday afternoon. Vegas has dropped four of their last seven games but three of those losses have come after regulation time so they’ve still been able to rack up some points in the standings.

The L.A. Kings are now on a three-game losing streak as they got dropped at home by a score of 4-3 by the Colorado Avalanche. The win was Colorado’s fourth in a row and they keep pace with the Stars for the top record in the Central Division.

After the Winnipeg Jets beat the Nashville Predators by a score of 2-0, the Calgary Flames were in a must-win situation against the Vancouver Canucks on Saturday night. The Canucks opened the scoring with two goals in the first period, the Flames battled back with two goals in the third, and Vancouver won the game in a shootout. Calgary is now one point back of Winnipeg for the second wild-card spot and the Jets have a game in hand.

The Oilers are now just two points back of the Golden Knights for the top spot in both the Pacific Division and the Western Conference. With two games left on the schedule, the Oilers need Vegas to drop one of their remaining games in order to jump them in the standings. The Oilers own the tiebreaker between the two teams as they have four more regulation and overtime wins.

The Golden Knights will be playing a home-and-home with the Seattle Kraken to close out the season. The Kraken are only two points behind the Kings in the standings so they could jump into third place in the Pacific Division. Neither L.A. nor Seattle can catch Edmonton now, so the Oilers will be the home team in the first round of the playoffs no matter what happens next.

The Oilers will play the Avalanche in Colorado on Tuesday before closing out their season at home against the Sharks on Thursday. Beating the Avs in regulation and also beating the Sharks would ensure that Edmonton finishes ahead of Colorado in the standings. That could be important later in the playoffs.