Stunning, last-minute comeback brings Edmonton Oilers back to life

Upon further review, the Edmonton Oilers are not dead yet.

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A team that never seems to get tired of playing dead, getting dirt shovelled on its grave and then rising up for a stunning comeback served up another resurrection story Friday night at Rogers Place.

Trailing 2-0 in the series and 4-3 in Game 3, they were 6:42 away from the end of their season. With their obituaries half written, they scored twice in 10 seconds, closed out the Los Angeles Kings 7-4 and are right back in the fight.

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It was wild.

Evander Kane scored to tie it 4-4 on a twice-reviewed goal — once for a kicking motion and then again for goaltender interference.

It passed both tests and L.A.’s ill-advised challenge put Edmonton on the power play, which Evan Bouchard scored on 10 seconds later to give Edmonton a 5-4 lead.

“I shot the puck into the net (after kicking it) and knew it was just a matter of them seeing the replay,” said Kane, who also set up Connor Brown in the second period to tie it 3-3. “You never know what can happen in those situations, but it was a good boost for our team and an important goal.

“Then the power play goes out and does its thing. It’s a big win for our group and hopefully gives us some momentum going into Game 4 and we’ll have a chance to hold serve on home ice.”

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Kings coach Jim Hiller defended the challenge, saying they took a long look at it and thought Kane impeded Darcy Kuemper.

“We got a good look at it, we took plenty of time and we thought it was goalie interference, so we challenged it,” he said. “Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose on those. Tonight we lost and it cost us big time.”

It was a shocking turn of events, turning a 4-3 deficit into a 5-4 lead in a matter of two shots.

“It was huge, we were fighting all third period to get one,” said Bouchard, who responded after two tough games to start the series with two massive goals in Game 3. “We knew it was going to be a dirty one and it was. When they challenged you really don’t know always with goaltender interference, but when we saw it was a good one we knew we had to pounce on them.”

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Connor McDavid and Connor Brown sealed it with empty netters, leaving the Oilers one win away from turning this thing into a best-of-three. After a slow start, the Oilers are finding a bit of a groove. They still need to tighten up the defence and could still use a few more saves, but things are coming around.

When the power play scores twice, needing three seconds on the first one and 10 seconds on the second, it’s a good sign.

“We just connected on our looks and went two-for-two,” said Leon Draisaitl. “They were timely goals, it was good. We executed well.”

It was shaping up to be an Edmonton romp, but in true Oilers fashion it turned into a horror movie.

The first 10 minutes went perfectly. Everything that the Oilers needed to happen happened. Ryan-Nugent Hopkins, who hadn’t done anything all series, scored at 2:49.

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Bouchard, who’d been a liability through the first two games, made it 2-0, at 8:43.

Edmonton had the lead, the power play had come to life, the place was rocking and the Oilers were right back in this series. They were proving what everyone already knew — their best was is more than enough beat Los Angeles.

Then, the exact reasons they were trailing 2-0 in the series started creeping into Game 3.

Two power play goals against (the sixth and seventh on 12 chances through three games) and top corner bullet over Calvin Pickard turned that 2-0 lead into a 3-2 deficit.

And when Edmonton tied it 3-3 on some spade work from Kane and Brown, all of the air got let out of the building nine seconds later when Trevor Moore, with Jake Walman draped all over him, scored a one-handed shot through Pickard’s five-hole. A horrible goal against made it 4-3 Kings at the second intermission and left the Oilers 20 minutes away from a certain first-round exit.

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It looked grim, but once again the Oilers found a way.

“We’ve got a lot of character,” said Draisaitl. “We’re going to go down swinging, if we go down. We’ve created that approach here and that attitude within this organization and we’re not going to back down until we’re out.”

E-mail: rtychkowski@postmedia.com

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