The Edmonton Oilers have defeated the LA Kings 4-1 and have moved on to the Second Round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs where they will face the winner of the Canucks and Preds series.

I wrote prior to yesterday's game that the Edmonton Oilers would need to hone their killer instincts and push hard to finish off the LA Kings before they get a chance to breath some life back into this series. That was exactly what they did.

Everything about this series showed to me that the Edmonton Oilers look ready to be a Stanley Cup contender. This isn't me saying "plan the parade" but the business like attitude of the Oilers in this series highly impressed me. After winning this series, guys weren't going crazy and celebrating like they've never won a series before. Sure the players were happy to be moving on, but from their expressions, to the answers they gave in post game interviews, the Oilers look like a team focused on the end goal.

A couple thoughts on this series as a whole:

The biggest story of this series was special teams. The Oilers finished the series with a 45% PP and a perfect PK. That of course means the Kings had a 55% PK and an abysmal 0% on the powerplay. I know some Kings fans want to nitpick a few calls that they believe shouldn't have been penalties... that's the playoffs, there are going to be some borderline calls and things that are called or get missed.

For the Oilers, they took advantage of both situations. First off, the Oilers deserve a bunch of credit for forcing the Kings into situations where they had to take penalties. Plenty of digital ink has been used to discuss the Kings stifling 1-3-1 system and the Oilers found ways to break it, leaving the Kings no choice but to hook, hold, and attempt to slow Edmonton down. Once Edmonton got onto the powerplay, they made the Kings pay despite LA having the second best PK in the regular season.

When LA got onto the powerplay themselves, Edmonton gave them nothing, keeping the team to the outside, limiting the quality chances, and getting the puck out before they could look for any rebounds. More impressive to me was that the Oilers were able to enact that same defensive coverage at 5 on 5. In last night's game, the Kings quickly went up 7-1 in shots but none of those shots had really any chance of going in. LA would shoot from the blue line without any real traffic in front and Skinner would easily swallow them up.

At 5 on 5 the Oilers were good but I think they can be better. Currently the Oilers have scored the second most 5 on 5 goals in the playoffs so anyone who thinks that they didn't produce at 5 on 5 is either an idiot, a troll, or both. That being said I would have liked to see a bit more from the bottom six and a few more chances created throughout the games. LA is a stifling team though, with much of their identity being around playing a tough defensive trap game. Edmonton should be able to produce more against either the Predators or the Canucks.

If we were giving out the Conn Smythe Trophy after one series I think Leon Draisaitl would be taking it. Draisaitl finished the series against the Kings going 5-5-10 in 5 games and was a dominant force at both ends of the ice. Draisaitl can be a frustrating player during the regular season. There are nights where he gets too cute with the drop passes or the circles in the offensive end that lead to turnovers. In the playoffs though, Draisaitl has always shown he has the ability to take over and be the best player on the ice for long stretches, even when he is sharing ice with Connor McDavid. He is a big body and against the Kings he wasn't afraid to throw a bit more into a hit or play with some more snarl. Game 5 was another great performance by #29.

Stuart Skinner finished the first round with a 0.910SV% and aside from some rough moments in Game 2 he was exactly what the Oilers needed in net. He made big saves and really didn't let in any bad goals that would take the wind out of the Oilers sails. I cannot remember a series where so many flukey and odd bounce goals were scored. Last night, the bounce of the stanchion that came right to Laferriere was a prime example. By my estimate, 5 of the 12 goals scored at 5 on 5 by LA were odd bounce or flukey goals.

Zach Hyman continued to impress and produce through the series and has found a home as Connor McDavid's winger. Having a duo like that always contributing on the score sheet and allowing Knoblauch to keep Draisaitl on another line is such a massive boon.

Evan Bouchard is currently third in scoring for the Oilers and in addition to his great passes and presence in the offensive end, he continues to take excellent steps forward in the defensive zone. He is not a shutdown defender but he is eliminating the egregious mistakes and his calmness in his own end is a huge asset to the blueline. Huge praise should also go to Ekholm who continues to just be pristine at both ends of the ice.

Holloway and Kane both had one really impressive game and while they didn't show up as much on the scoresheet in other games, still created some chances. While McLeod was held pointless, he is quickly becoming one of the best defensive centres in the NHL and posted great numbers in limiting chances of LA's best players.

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Now a few issues.

After a good Game 1, Adam Henrique was pretty invisible for the remainder of the series. Obviously Hyman and McDavid are going to carry the brunt of the workload on that top line but he needs to contribute more. A mere 4 shots while playing on the top line simply is not good enough.

The same goes for Ryan Nugent Hopkins. While he currently has an impressive 6 points in 5 games, he has not really generated much of anything at 5 on 5 and similar to Henrique, only has 6 shots in 5 shots. Barely averaging a shot a game as a top six player as well as all the PP time he gets is just not good enough. RNH does wonderful things on the powerplay and defensively he is brilliant but he needs to put more pressure on goalies and not be afraid to use his deceptively quick wrist shot.

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Oilers fans should now be hoping for a lengthy Preds and Canucks series. Based on scheduling, it looks like regardless of when their series concludes Round 2 will not begin until Tuesday at the earliest for the Oilers. Having this additional rest time to heal up and prep for opponents is a huge boon for Edmonton and a well deserved gift for wrapping up Round 1 with such conviction.

Let the Predators and Canucks duke it out for a couple more games, I look forward to updating you all with my thoughts on their Round 2 opponent.

Thanks for reading!

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