Recap: Rough First Period Costs Ducks in 6-2 Loss to Oilers

The Ducks could not overcome a four-goal Edmonton first period tonight, falling 6-2 to the Oilers at Honda Center in the penultimate contest of a franchise-record 10-game homestand.
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The loss dropped Anaheim to 12-26-4 on the season and 8-12-1 on home ice. The Ducks now sit 3-5-1 on the homestand, heading to Friday's finale vs. New Jersey.
Sam Carrick and Simon Benoit scored for Anaheim. Max Comtois added two assists. Making his 28th start of the season John Gibson made 31 saves in two periods of action. Anthony Stolarz stopped all 16 shots he faced in the third.
Dylan Holloway, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Connor McDavid, Klim Kostin (twice) and Leon Draisaitl scored for the Oilers, who avoided a three-game losing skid and improved to 22-18-3 on the year.
First-year Oiler netminder Jack Campbell earned his 10th win in the orange, blue and white with 21 saves.
A day after Anaheim's head coach, Dallas Eakins, pointed to clean breakouts as a key to the club's success against Edmonton, the Ducks surrendered four first-period goals, each directly following defensive zone turnovers.
The first came on the type of goal that has established McDavid as one of the game's greats. After the Ducks turned the puck over in the defensive zone, the Oiler captain took a pass behind the Anaheim net, keeping his back to the slot before delivering a perfect backhand pass to Holloway, who swiped it home before Gibson could adjust.
McDavid has points in 23 of his last 24 games, including his last five appearances. With two points on the night, the 25-year-old, who ranks fourth in NHL history in career points-per-game, owns 36 points in 22 career matchups against Anaheim.
Holloway has goals in two of his last four games, his second and third career NHL markers.
Nugent-Hopkins doubled the lead 74 seconds later on a fortunate bounce for the visitors. After the Ducks failed to evacuate their defensive zone following a won faceoff, Edmonton got the puck to Nugent-Hopkins at the right point, where he stepped in and fired a wrister off Fowler's foot, changing the shot's course just enough to fool Gibson and give the Oilers a 2-0 edge.
The goal clinched Nugent-Hopkins' fifth career twenty-goal season and his first since the 2019-20 campaign. The first overall pick in 2011 and now the longest-tenured active Oiler, Nugent-Hopkins became the club's fourth 20-goal scorer this season (also McDavid, Leon Draisaitl and Zach Hyman), the most by any NHL club through 43 games since 1995-96.
Anaheim temporarily got back within a goal on a hard-working shift by the third line. As Carrick and Comtois went to work on the forecheck behind the net, Carrick poked a loose puck free behind the cage for his linemmate. Comtois then hustled around the net with a defender on his back and returned to the favor to Carrick, delivering a backdoor pass that the centerman buried through Campbell to cut the host's deficit in half.

Carrick has two goals in his last five games and 3-2=5 points in 27 games this season. Comtois' assist marked his first of the year.
McDavid struck again just minutes later though to restore a two-goal game, taking advantage of another defensive zone turnover on a simply absurd individual effort. As Kailer Yamamoto took the puck away from Cam Fowler on the forecheck, McDavid swooped in from high in the zone and collected a short pass from his winger, making it seem like he was going to head behind the net and potentially look for a wraparound. Instead, McDavid threw on the brakes and turned towards the slot, creating space between him and the defending Trevor Zegras before wiring a backhander over Gibson's glove.
McDavid's goal was his league-leading 35th of the season in just his 43rd game, the fastest to that mark in any season among active NHLers. McDavid also became the fourth Oiler to score 35 goals in 43 games, joining Hall of Famers Wayne Gretzky, Jari Kurri and Glenn Anderson.
McDavid leads the NHL in points (35-44=79), goals and assists this season.
Kostin bookended the first intermission with a pair of goals to put the Oilers ahead 5-1 at the game's midway point.
The former St. Louis winger initially capped the first-period outburst with 58 seconds to play, intercepting Dmitry Kulikov's breakout pass and beating Gibson with a low forehand shot from in tight. He scored again early in the second on an Anaheim defensive zone breakdown, finding enough open space in the slot to hammer a one-timer past Gibson's glove side.
Kostin has 7-4=11 points in 27 games since joining the Oilers this season.
The Edmonton lead hit five on a late second-period power play when Draisaitl drove hard to the net and tipped home a shot pass from young defenseman Evan Bouchard.
The Ducks kept pushing in the third period despite the five-goal deficit, cutting into Edmonton's lead early on, but it would be far too little too late for the home side.
Benoit made it a 6-2 game with his second NHL goal, scored in the first minute of the third. With Carrick taking up space in front of Campbell, Benoit collected a pass from Brett Leason at the left point, turning to get into a shooting position and beating Campbell glove side right through Carrick's screen.

Comtois collected the secondary assist for his first multi-point game of the season. With the goal, Benoit has points in two of his last three games.
That would be as close as Anaheim would come though as Edmonton shut the door from there and locked down a 6-2 victory.
The Ducks conclude their franchise-record 10-game homestand Friday night against New Jersey.