LAS VEGAS —To win 16 straight hockey games takes more than just strong defence, great goaltending and timely scoring. It takes some breaks.
Frankly, you tend to need more than your share of the luck to win every game since Dec. 21, 2023. And even though the old hockey maxim decrees that a good team earns its luck, eventually you run up against another good team, and they deserve some too.
A near-record winning streak is forged on a wide-open net missed by the Blackhawks one night, when you’re down 1-0. It’s a post-and-in for the Oilers at Montreal, but a post-and-out when Nazem Kadri is shooting in Calgary.
This much we know to be true: the Oilers played far better in a 3-1 loss that ended their 16-game win streak in Vegas Tuesday night than they had on two or three nights where they’d found a way to extend the streak over the past 47 days.
They just ran out of fortune. Used it all up, really.
“Yeah, yeah,” agreed Connor McDavid. “We had a lot of things go right, obviously. Winning 16 straight, you’ve got to have a lot of things go well. You’ve got to get some bounces, and we got some bounces. But for the most part, I thought we went out and earned our bounces and earned our luck.
“Credit to (Vegas). Tonight they make the shot.”
In no world was this winning streak, put to rest while tied for the second longest in NHL history, simply luck. It just takes some good fortune to keep winning, night after night, when you’re constantly tied at 1-1 after 40 minutes as these teams were in Vegas.
Since Dec. 21, Edmonton has proved itself as a team that can limit their opponents to two goals or less — and did so again Tuesday until William Karlsson’s empty netter put a stake to the streak. This streak undoubtedly represents the best hockey of the McDavid era; a brand of hockey — complete with elite, elite goaltending — that has people taking an entirely new look at this outfit’s readiness to win a Stanley Cup.
A win streak full of 5-4 games would have been same ol’ same ol’ in Northern Alberta.
A team record 14 games allowing two goals or fewer? That’s a whole new ballgame, for a club with this much offensive punch.
“Over the course of 16 games, they weren’t lucky wins by any means. I think we were playing the right way,” said Darnell Nurse, who has been an absolute horse this season. “Along the way you create your own luck by doing the right things, and over the 16 games we (did enough of that) to have that that win streak.”
Can he take a step back and appreciate the accomplishment of rattling off 32 consecutive points?
“Maybe tomorrow,” said Nurse, who hasn’t forgotten how to be sour after a loss.
The Oilers were the better, faster team on Tuesday, in a hard-fought game between two former playoff foes — with a first-round meeting this spring growing more and more likely with every Vancouver Canucks win.
If that’s how it unfolds, the Oilers can not be disappointed with what they saw on Tuesday.
Vegas spent much of the game chasing Edmonton — the disparity in team speed was noticeable — and were fortunate that in a game where the Golden Knights were forced to lay some heavy sticks on Edmonton players whose speed had given them position on their foe, the referees gave the Oilers only one power play all game long.
This game was settled on an Evan Bouchard goal post, a fantastic game from Vegas goalie Adin Hill — who made a miraculous mask save on Leon Draisaitl at one point — and a desperation deflection by defenceman Nicolas Hague that denied Ryan McLeod while staring at a wide-open cage.
Some nights, the other team gets those bounces. It hasn’t happened that way for Edmonton in weeks.
“We couldn’t bear down on our chances,” said defenceman Mattias Ekholm, who felt some relief in saying goodbye to the chase for the Pittsburgh Penguins record of 17 straight wins. “I’m kind of happy I don’t have to talk about it anymore. You want to win every game you can, but the closer we got to this whole record thing I feel like the more and more talk there was about it.
“Now it’s behind us. We have to start a new streak.”
Of course, the 16-game winning streak isn’t the only tear that was torn up and left on the dressing room floor at T-Mobile Arena.
The Oilers had set a team record of 14 games allowing two goals or fewer, they snapped a nine-game road winning streak, and Stuart Skinner’s personal 12-game winning streak will now reside in the Oilers history books at the all-time franchise record.
So they’ll head to Palm Springs for a day of golf with owner Daryl Katz on Wednesday, and roll into Anaheim for a Friday night game that they are expected to win.
The streak was fun, and having a team that can play the type of hockey this streak was built on will be fun as well.
In April, May, and perhaps even June.
