Golden Knights recap: Oilers stars shine bright in blowout win

Series tied 1-1

■ Game 1 — Knights 6, Oilers 4

■ Game 2 — Oilers 5, Knights 1

■ Game 3 — 5:30 p.m. Monday, Rogers Place (ESPN)

■ Game 4 — 7 p.m. Wednesday, Rogers Place (ESPN)

■ Game 5 — TBD Friday, T-Mobile Arena (TNT)

■ Game 6* — TBD Sunday, Rogers Place (TBA)

■ Game 7* — TBD Tuesday, T-Mobile Arena (TNT)

* If necessary

RJ’s three stars

3. Oilers defenseman Evan Bouchard— The 23-year-old former first-round pick converted his only shot into a goal and added an assist. He has a point in eight straight games, a franchise record for a defenseman.

2. Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl— After scoring four goals in Game 1, Draisaitl settled for two Saturday. He got the festivities started with a power-play goal 2:21 into the game, then extended the lead to 4-0 late in the first period when the puck found him in front after Knights goalie Laurent Brossoit was knocked to the ice.

1. Oilers forward Connor McDavid — The superstar had two goals and an assist, but might have qualified for this honor based solely on style points on the short-handed, unassisted piece of art he produced midway through the first period. McDavid took the puck near the blue line in the defensive zone, skated past Shea Theodore, then held him off while using his free hand to slide the puck past Brossoit. McDavid also assisted on Draisaitl’s first goal and added a power-play goal in the second period.

Key play

Brayden McNabb penalty at 1:13 of the first period

The Knights won Game 1 despite Edmonton finding its usual success on the power play, but they couldn’t afford to put the Oilers on the man-advantage early Saturday and let them find their game. Instead, McNabb was sent to the box for cross-checking almost immediately. Draisaitl converted 1:08 later, and the rout was on.

Another candidate for this honor was McDavid’s short-handed goal at 11:11 of the first period. The Knights trailed 2-0, but had just gone on the power play and had hope of getting right back into the game.

McDavid crushed those thoughts with his highlight-reel goal.

Key stat

19-4 — Sure, the 4-0 lead was one indication of the Oilers’ dominance in the first 20 minutes.

It went far beyond that, however.

Edmonton put 19 shots on net in the first period, many of them of the dangerous variety.

The Knights mustered four, and they weren’t particularly challenging for Stuart Skinner.

Zach Hyman led the way with four shots in the period, and Draisaitl had three. Hyman also had three assists in the first. In all, 11 players got a shot on goal in the period.

No Knights player had more than one.

Knights quotable

“Most disappointing part of the game for me as a head coach. You’re gonna have nights when you’re going to get out-executed, certainly by this team. They were more competitive, but we sort of got out-teammated, for lack of a better term. That’s disappointing, as it should never happen to the Vegas Golden Knights. We talked about that, and going forward that hopefully is the first thing we correct,” Knights coach Bruce Cassidy, on how long it took his team to appear emotionally involved in the game.

Oilers quotable

“You also don’t see a lot of guys getting jumped from behind and head-locked. When you want to (expletive) around, sometimes you find out. That’s what happened.” — Oilers forward Evander Kane, on the rare sight of his series of body shots to a downed Keegan Kolesar.

Contact Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AdamHillLVRJ on Twitter.