BLOG: Bouchard breaking through in second Stanley Cup Playoffs

LOS ANGELES, CA - Leading the charge from the back end on Zach Hyman's Game 4 overtime winner was Evan Bouchard, just like he has all series for the Edmonton Oilers.
"I think he's taking steps every night and he keeps showing it in the playoffs, which is the biggest stage and the hardest to be an offensive defenceman," Mattias Ekholm said. "He's been great for us."
Heading into Monday night's action around the NHL in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, there's no defenceman in the League who has more points than the 23-year-old, who's coming off a massive three-point performance in a team-leading 28:25 of ice time in Edmonton's 5-4 overtime victory over the Kings in Game 4.
Bouchard has contributed two important goals and chipped in five assists over the first four games of the Oilers first-round series with the Kings that's split 2-2 heading into what's now become a best-of-three just as it did in last year's playoff matchup between these two Pacific Division rivals.
"I did not know much about him coming here at all. I just got the chance to play with him and I can see the talent," Ekholm added. "I mean, he's such a raw offensive talent and he just sees the ice really well. It's great to see because I saw in the first couple of games how he was scratching the surface of something that could be a tremendous superstar in this league."

Since teaming up with Ekholm in a defensive pairing and taking over power-play responsibilities from the departed Tyson Barrie after the Trade Deadline, the Oakville, Ont. product has produced seven goals and 19 assists in 25 regular-season and playoff games as he continues to thrive in the position that his teammates and coaching staff knew he was destined to assume as a top-pairing defender and the quarterback of the best power play in NHL history.
"I think anyone that spends any time around our group and sees him every day knows what a player he is," Connor McDavid, third in Oilers playoff points behind Bouchard and Leon Draisaitl, said Monday morning.
"You knew it was only a matter of time for Bouch before he kind of stepped into that role. Obviously, he's had a really good run here coming into the playoffs and this series and he's been great."
For Head Coach Jay Woodcroft, Bouchard was a critical piece to the Oilers comeback in Game 4 similar to how his performance back in November during a visit to the Big Apple helped plant some of that belief in their locker room on Sunday night that the game was nowhere near over after 20 minutes down 3-0 to the Kings at Crypto.com Arena.

"I thought we did grow as a team yesterday, but I think the seeds of that comeback were probably planted earlier in the season when we were in that position before, in a tough building in Madison Square Garden, against one of the league's best teams," Woodcroft said.
Bouchard's first two goals of the season back on Nov. 26 started a four-goal third period for the Oilers in a comeback 4-3 victory over the New York Rangers, and a 'Bouch Bomb' kickstarted Edmonton's answer in the second period in Sunday's Game 4 against Los Angeles.
A 92.6 mile-per-hour clapper by Bouchard on the power play got the Oilers on the board with his second goal of the series before he picked up the secondary assist on Draisaitl's tying goal with 11 seconds remaining in the second period.

When Zach Hyman described his overtime-winning goal to the media, he began with the incredible pass made by Bouchard, who saw an opening in Los Angeles' 1-3-1 neutral-zone coverage and sent a full-ice pass all the way up to Hyman to intercept and bury under Joonas Korpisalo's right arm 10:39 into overtime.
"Just a great breakout pass from Bouch from behind the net to kind of spring me," Hyman said. "I think we caught them on a line change."
Since making his playoff debut in 2022, Bouchard leads all Oilers defenceman in playoff scoring with 16 points (5G, 11A) in 20 career playoff games.