Ron MacLean

Adam Henrique has been so good with Doc and Frederick and Jason Dickinson's been just unbelievable in the third line role.

So that was beginning to be a concern.

The rookie team, you know, 14 rookies on the Ducks team.

Every key guy, Troy Terry or Leo Carlson, and now Cutter Gauthier chimes in with a pair.

They're starting to roll.

And whenever the Oilers got a big goal, dry sidle early, Gauthier cut it less than four minutes later.

Connor Murphy scored a huge goal that cut it to 3-2.

Four minutes later, Ryan Poehling scored.

And when Szymanski gets that absolutely gorgeous tying goal, it's two minutes later, not even, a minute and 17, and they go ahead again on Gauthier's goal.

So those windows where they had the inability to kind of ride the crowd and the energy of Rogers Place, that Anaheim was able to do that was, to me, a storyline.

No, that's a good point.

I would say they both do play similar games.

They both have tons of talent and kind of can outscore their defensive lapses when they have them.

The feeling had been, as you know, that Edmonton was buckling down and doing what they've done in the last two playoff years, and that's play great defense.

It felt like Connor Murphy's arrival had been like Ekholm's a couple of years ago, and that they were really solid on the back end and they should be able to defend, and especially on special teams.

You know, that was everybody had it tilted Edmonton's favor.

So for them to go for four and the other guys two for three, you know, these were all surprises.

And and you could be right.

Maybe that just comes from them thinking, you know, they are good enough to do that.

But for sure, they'll have to reapply themselves defensively for game three.