What a brutal game that one turned out to be.
On Saturday afternoon, the Edmonton Oilers played the Dallas Stars in a 2024 Western Conference Final rematch, losing 4-1 to the Texas-based team.
The main storyline of this game is that the Oilers dominated through the first 39 minutes or so, but were unable to beat Jake Oettinger. Seconds after their first penalty kill started, the Stars immediately capitalized as Matt Duchene beat Stuart Skinner to take a 1-0 lead heading into the third period.
Duchene scored his second goal of the game with just under eight minutes left. Evan Bouchard stumbled, causing a good opportunity for the Stars, and Mason Marchment passed over to Duchene for the easy tap-in.
The game was sealed 70 seconds later, as Roope Hintz scored his third goal of the season as he was left all alone in the slot. Pretty ugly defence here from the Oilers.
Thankfully, the Oilers weren’t shut out for the second time in six games, as Leon Draisaitl scored his third of the season with the net pulled to make it 3-1. However, the Stars scored an empty net goal shortly afyer, giving us the final score of 4-1.

Takeaways…

Despite the 4-1 loss, it’s hard to say that the Oilers played poorly. At one point during the second period, the Oilers were outshooting the Stars 17-4. By the end of the game, the shots were 31-24 in favour of the Oilers, with Dallas outshooting Edmonton 13-10 in the final frame.
The fact of the matter is that the Oilers ran into a hot (and very good) goaltender in Jake Oettinger. There’s a reason why the 25-year-old signed a $66 million contract a couple of days ago, as he now has a .953 save percentage and a 1.48 goals-against average in four games.
With that being said, the Oilers’ special teams remain the worst in the league. Coming into the game, they had the fourth-worst power play at 7.7% (1/14) and once again failed to capitalize on their two power plays, as they now have a 6.3 power play percentage this season.
For the fifth time in six games, the Oilers allowed the first goal of the season and, coincidentally, also allowed a goal on the penalty kill in the game. The team had a league-worst 57.9 PK% coming into this game. It’s an area that significantly needs to improve, and maybe losing Vincent Desharnais and Cody Ceci is not a good thing.
Edmonton’s next game is on Tuesday, as they return home to host the Carolina Hurricanes at 7:00 PM MT. With a 2-4-0 record, they really need to string some wins together here.
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