Draisaitl wins Game 2 in overtime, Oilers take 2-0 series lead
Posted May 8, 2025 3:24 pm.
Last Updated May 8, 2025 11:46 pm.
Leon Draisaitl scored the overtime winner, and the Oilers are taking a 2-0 series lead back to Edmonton.
Golden Knights’ Nicolas Roy was assessed a 5-minute major and a 10-minute misconduct after he cross-checked Oilers’ Trent Fredric in the face in overtime. Despite this, the Oilers did not score on the extended power play opportunity, but were able to keep the pressure on Vegas.
Connor McDavid and Draisaitl broke into the Golden Knights’ end on a 2-on-1, and McDavid dished it to Draisaitl, who fired it past Adin Hill to end it.
LEON AND CONNOR CONNECT FOR THE GAME WINNER! ????
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 9, 2025
The Oilers take a 2-0 series lead following Leon Draisaitl's Subway Canada OT winner! pic.twitter.com/0Gdyc03JRo
As for the rest of the game, in a similar fashion to Game 1, the Golden Knights opened the scoring in Game 2 on a power play as Victor Olofsson scored the opener midway through the first.
Just beyond the midway point of the second, Jake Walman fired a shot from the blue line, which pinballed off two Golden Knights’ players and past Adin Hill, leveling the game at one. The tally was Walman’s first career playoff goal.
JAKE WALMAN IS AN EDMONTON OILER ‼️ pic.twitter.com/YpYdg5XgHU
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 9, 2025
Moments later, Vasily Podkolzin took the puck into the Vegas end and fired it past Hill, scoring his first playoff goal to give the Oilers a 2-1 lead.
FIRST PLAYOFF GOAL FOR VASILY PODKOLZIN ????
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 9, 2025
OILERS LEAD ????️ pic.twitter.com/AGZJLUtFzS
Just under two minutes later, a tired Leon Draisaitl forced a turnover, and the puck fell to Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, who passed it to Darnell Nurse. Nurse would walk in and add to the Oilers scoring making it 3-1.
DARNELL NURSE HAS ARRIVED IN VEGAS ???????? pic.twitter.com/cneXqthXC9
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 9, 2025
Under a minute later, William Karlsson would answer for Vegas, cutting the Oilers’ lead back to one, with 1:50 to go in the second period.
Less than two minutes into the third, Evander Kane would double the Oilers’ lead. The goal came off a crisp passing play involving Nugent-Hopkins and Zach Hyman.
EVANDER KANE MAKES IT 4-2 EDMONTON ???? pic.twitter.com/mzmFr2TJXa
— Sportsnet (@Sportsnet) May 9, 2025
A couple of minutes later, Olofsson would score his second of the game on a power play after captain Connor McDavid high-sticked a Golden Knight player. The goal cut the lead back to within one.
Additionally, on the Knights’ goal, Jake Eichel would pick up his third assist of the game.
Alex Pietrangelo would level it with 8:02 to go in the third. His low wrister from the blue line beat Calvin Pickard to make it 4-4.
Game 3 will be played in Edmonton at 7 p.m. on Saturday.
Age looking to help in NHL playoffs
The oldest team left in Stanley Cup contention leans into its experience to navigate tense moments, and there’s been plenty of them.
The Edmonton Oilers with an average age of 30.6 years, and in its seventh playoff series in the last two seasons, feel at home in the eye of the storm.
They’ve already been down two games to start a series, which was the case in the first round against the Los Angeles Kings.
The Oilers then became the first NHL team to win five straight playoff games coming from behind, including Game 1 in the second round against the Vegas Golden Knights.
“This team is built for the playoffs,” Edmonton forward Zach Hyman said.
“We have experience to win games in a lot of different ways and a lot of untraditional ways.”
That’s not to say the Oilers were comfortable with a slow start to this post-season.
“I guess we realized it’s playoff time,” defenceman Evan Bouchard said. “There’s no time to really, you know, screw around. You lose, you go home.
“We know what we have in this room. We know it doesn’t come too often that you get a championship team, so you’ve got to take advantage of it.”
Edmonton scored the first goal of a game just once in their first seven.
“Definitely not a recipe that we want to get used to, but we are used to it now. We’re comfortable in those positions, which is a good thing,” Bouchard said.
“We have belief in each other that we are going to come back and if we can start with the lead, then we know we can hang on to that too.”
The Oilers reached Game 7 of last year’s Stanley Cup final before falling 2-1 to the Florida Panthers.
“We’ve still got that feeling from last year,” Bouchard said. “We want to get back to where we were.”
Edmonton had more than half a dozen skaters who missed time down the regular-season stretch, or longer, trying to reintegrate themselves into the lineup to start the post-season.
That accounted somewhat for falling behind 2-0 in the first-round against the Los Angeles Kings.
“It was definitely clunky first two games there in L.A,. but I thought we’ve responded since,” captain Connor McDavid said.
“Our game’s just building. I know that’s weird to say in the middle of the playoffs, but when you don’t have a ton of runway . . . we’re putting the pieces together and building our game as we go.”
Corey Perry, who turns 40 on May 16, helps raise Edmonton’s average age over the Toronto Maple Leafs at 30.2.
Florida (29.8), Dallas (29.7), Vegas (29.3), Washington (29), Carolina (28.8) and Winnipeg (28.4) round out the eight teams still playing for the Cup.
“We know how to play the right way, we know to win hockey games,” Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl said. “It’s just a matter of doing it more consistent than all the other teams.”
