Jackson Blake scored twice, Carolina survived the potent Edmonton Power Play, and the Hurricanes took their second straight on their Pacific Road Trip defeating Connor McDavid and the Oilers 6-3.
It was the first game for Carolina since a quiet deadline day that saw the Hurricanes involved, per reports, in several discussions but ultimately settling to not make a big move at the deadline for the first time since 2023.
The Oilers were able to get on the board first thanks to a misplay by Mark Jankowski,
reinserted into the lineup after a night to let Jesperi Kotkaniemi play before the trade deadline. Jankowski had a rush down the ice with Jordan Martinook, however instead of shooting he tried a pass. Connor McDavid was able to get the puck off the muffed pass, and fed a beautiful feed to Zach Hyman. Hyman got between the defense, staked all alone, and flipped the puck past Frederik Anderesen.
However, Carolina didn’t take long to recover. The Hurricanes would score just 37 seconds later—while the arena PA was still reading off the notes of Hyman’s goal—when Rod Brind’Amour sent out the Sebastian Aho line for the bump up shift. Aho and Seth Jarvis drew several Oilers over to the far wall, and when Jarvis started to skate towards the goal they tried to compress on him. He was able to feed a great pass to Shayne Gostisbehere who immediately fired it on net, past a leaning Tristan Jarry to knot the score at one.
Then 46 seconds after that, the next bump up shift led by the Jordan Stall line got it into the offensive zone again, and some hard work by Jalen Chatfield got the puck over to Nikolaj Ehlers, who blasted it past Jarry for his 20th on the season and a quick 2-1 lead not even 90 seconds after Edmonton put them down 1-0.
The Canes had to weather the dangerous Edmonton Power Play at the end of the period thanks to a questionable call against Taylor Hall, but they held the Oilers to zero shots on the whole two minutes, and ended the period up 2-1 with an 8-3 shot advantage.
Carolina started the second period quickly, as 1:37 in they were able to get the puck in deep. Ehlers picked up his second point of the night as he feathered a perfect pass over to Jordan Martinook. Martinook wasn’t able to get the full power on his first shot but stuck with it and was able to push a second attempt past Jarry to give Carolina a 3-1 lead.
It looked like Carolina was firmly in control, but just two minutes later Vasily Podkolzin just willed a goal into existence thanks to some poor play by Sean Walker, bad goal coverage by Andersen, and an insane shot. Edmonton was able to get the puck in deep, but Jackson Blake was able to grab it to try and get it out of the zone. Walker, however, misread where the puck was going and the puck was left where Blake had tried to pass it. Podkolzin closed in on Walker as he tried to recover, got the puck and skated toward Andersen. Alexander Nikishin recovered to push Podkolzin to the side, and Podkolzin put the puck on net from near the goal line. Andersen didn’t close the gap between himself and the post, and the puck found that gab to close the score to 3-2.
Andersen would recover for the rest of the period to keep the score at 3-2, and while the Canes were able to pepper the former Penguin Jarry with 18 shots to only nine by Edmonton, the second ended with the gap the same as the first. One negative from the period was how early on Gostisbehere took a harder check to the boards, left the ice, and didn’t return forcing the the Canes to play with five defensemen for the rest of the game. This was after he took a skate blade to the face in the first before his goal.
Carolina started the third on a power play when officials called a tripping call on Connor McDavid, but the Canes were unsuccessful in it. The ice started to tilt to Edmonton, but then the Logan Stankoven/Taylor Hall/Jackson Blake line struck for the first time since their torrid performance last week. The sequence started with a little luck as the Oilers just missed a goal by hitting a post, and then the Canes were able to rush the puck in the opposite direction. Sebastian Aho sped down the ice drawing a penalty, but the Canes were able to keep possession and set up 6-on-5. Carolina would keep it in the zone for over a minute without an Edmonton skater gaining possession, and eventually Blake would get a great feed by K’Andre Miller, and blast a shot by Jarry to take a 4-2 lead.
The officials would eventually apologize to McDavid by calling a dubious tripping call on Miller a few minutes later, and the Edmonton Power Play wouldn’t be denied. Hyman would get his second on the night wide open in front of the net to make the score 4-3. From there, though, the Canes would shut down the Oilers. Jarry would leave the net, but eventually Jordan Staal was able to fly out of the zone and take another pass by Miller to pot it into the empty net.
Edmonton wouldn’t pull Jarry again even though there was about a minute left, however, the Stankoven line went back out on the ice, set up in the zone, and Jackson Blake once again did what he had been told to do more of—shoot the puck. His goal would erase any doubt about this game, setting the final 6-3 score.
The goal was Blake’s 19th which sets a new bar for a career high in his second full season. Miller also stood strong on a night all five defensemen remaining had to work by getting three points, all on assists, and Jalen Chatfield had one of his strongest games as a Hurricane.
The Canes head to the other part of Alberta for the last game of this road trip Saturday night, facing a Calgary team that waived the white flag and traded Nazem Kadri right at the deadline to Colorado. Brandon Bussi will get the start, what remains to be seen is how severe Gostisbehere’s injury is and how long it might keep him out. As the Canes now are 11 points up on Pittsburgh for the Metropolitan lead, expect the team to be careful with any injury from here on out.
