Ryan Nugent-Hopkins had a goal and four assists, Connor McDavid had three assists and Leon Draisaitl added a goal and an assist as the Edmonton Oilers cruised to a 7-4 victory over the Vegas Golden Knights on Tuesday night in Las Vegas.
It was the second five-point game of Nugent-Hopkins’ career. Evander Kane scored the 300th goal of his career and Zach Hyman, Darnell Nurse, Evan Bouchard and Brett Kulak also scored for Edmonton (43-23-9, 95 points), which closed to within three points of the first-place Golden Knights (46-22-6, 98 points) in the Pacific Division.
Stuart Skinner finished with 18 saves as the Oilers extended their point streak to eight games (7-0-1).
Jonathan Marchessault scored two goals for Vegas, which had a four-game winning streak snapped. Alex Pietrangelo had two assists and William Karlsson and Michael Amadio also scored, while Jonathan Quick stopped 28 of 34 shots before giving way to Laurent Brossoit, who made four saves.
Edmonton, playing the second game of a back-to-back that began with a 5-4 win at Arizona on Monday, took a 3-2 lead in a wild first period that saw five goals in the first 10 minutes.
Marchessault gave Vegas a 1-0 lead just 72 seconds into the game, but the Oilers tied it just 37 seconds later on a power-play goal by Bouchard.
Nugent-Hopkins made it 2-1 at the 8:20 mark when he scooped up Nicolas Roy’s turnover in the slot and then fired a wrist shot past Quick’s glove side for his 35th goal of the season. Karlsson tied it 1:04 later with a short-handed goal.
Draisaitl put Edmonton back ahead, 3-2, just 24 seconds later with his 47th goal of the season; he tapped in a cross-crease pass from McDavid.
Vegas tied it early in the second period on Amadio’s 13th goal, but Edmonton answered with three goals in a span of 9:33 to break the game open.
Nurse got the first at the 6:01 mark with a sharp-angle slap shot from the bottom of the left circle. Kane followed with his milestone goal before Hyman potted his 33rd goal on a power play off a cross-crease pass from McDavid.
Kulak made it four unanswered goals for the Oilers early in the third period when he came out of the penalty box and scored his first goal since Dec. 7.
Marchessault ended the scoring with 1:32 remaining.
–Field Level Media
