May 21, 2025 by Ryan Lotsberg

It wouldn’t be an Edmonton Oilers playoff game without a multi-goal comeback, would it? The Oilers had a 3-1 lead entering the third period, and that’s when it all came unraveled. 

The Stars started the third period on the powerplay, and they converted to pull within one. They got another powerplay chance three minutes into the period, and they scored on that one too. Tie game. They took the lead on another powerplay just over two minutes later. The Stars scored three powerplay goals in the first six minutes of the third period to take the lead. That’s all they needed, but they added two more goals for good measure to take Game 1 6-3.

Callouts

The Oilers penalty kill wasn’t good enough in Game 1. They killed one penalty in the first period, but couldn’t come up with a kill in the third period when they needed one. The total damage was 1/4 on the kill. Those three third period powerplay goals killed the Oilers in Game 1.

Brett Kulak took two penalties in the game. They weren’t necessarily terrible penalties to take, but the penalty that he took with about a minute left in the second period ended up costing the Oilers.

Standouts

Leon Draisaitl and Connor McDavid were tremendous in Game 1. Draisaitl got three points, including a great shot over the shoulder of Jake Oettinger on the far side to open the scoring. He had multiple other scoring chances where he dangled through multiple Stars defenders as well. I can’t let him get away without mentioning the giveaway that led to the Stars’ first goal, but I also feel that was well defended by Mason Marchment and Tyler Seguin.

McDavid had two assists in the game, but he could’ve had more. He had his feet moving early in the game, and he created a lot of dangerous scoring chances.

Shoutouts

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins scored the Oilers’ first road powerplay goal of the playoffs. He also had an assist and four shots on goal.

Evan Bouchard scored for the first time since the first round. He wasn’t quite able to one-time the pass he got from Nugent-Hopkins, but he walked around the defender and sniped one over Oettinger’s glove.

It was a lopsided final score, which obviously meant there was some pushing and shoving after the final whistle. Corey Perry went after Lian Bischel, and the referees broke up the fight before it got started. After the confrontation, Perry looked at Bischel and put his head between his arms as if he was protecting himself like a turtle hiding in its shell to mock Bischel’s actions while Perry was going after him. It didn’t impact the outcome of the game, but things like that are why Perry is known as “the Worm”. He knew exactly what he was doing, and he was clearly trying to get under the rookie’s skin.

Wrap

That’s the formula the Stars need to follow if they want to win this series. They made good on two rush chances, they dominated the special teams battle, and Oettinger was the better goaltender. If they get those three things consistently throughout the series, they will win.

Related: Oilers vs Stars II: Series Preview

The bright side for the Oilers is that they had a 58.08% expected goals for percentage at five-on-five. They were clearly the better five-on-five team. That’s a big positive to take into Game 2. If they can clean up the penalty kill, they will be fine.

Game 2 will go on Friday night in Dallas.