It didn't matter that the Oilers jumped out to a 2–0 lead in Game 3. It didn't matter that Stuart Skinner, forced back into action after Calvin Pickard's injury, allowed fewer goals than he did in his two catastrophic starts against the Kings. And it didn't matter that, with the score 3–2 Vegas in the final few minutes, Connor McDavid unlocked the Golden Knights' defense with a little pass from the corner that went in off an enemy skate. All anyone's going to remember from Saturday night is the very last second, which is how Vegas managed to cut into Edmonton's 2–0 series lead.
Any reasonable person would have been ready for overtime as William Karlsson broke into the offensive zone and took the puck behind the net with under five seconds to play. But in retrospect, when the VGK original sent the puck flying backward into the slot for another one of his expansion-season brethren, Reilly Smith, neither man had yet given up on the third period, and there was still enough time to inflict the knockout blow. Smith, using nearly every tenth of a second allotted to him, zoomed past a diving Oilers defender and tried to round a sliding Skinner as he fired a shot in the direction of the crease. The puck bounced so quickly that in real time, the closest official didn't see a goal. But replay review revealed the buzzer-beater, and worse, the person most responsible for it crossing the line.
Here's the key look in GIF form:
That puck would not have done any damage were it not for the presence of an Edmonton stick. Of all people, that stick belonged to one of the most awe-inspiring, most skilled, most valuable players in the NHL: Leon Draisaitl. The man who won Game 2 in OT for the Oilers unwittingly made the fatal mistake in Game 3. I get sick to my stomach watching the tragedy of that crucial deflection, and I didn't even have anything to do with it. It's Draisaitl himself who had to sit through the review, rewatch his role in the play, and then stoically answer questions about the own goal before finally being allowed to go home.
“We didn't sort it out very well, to let the puck get into the slot,” he said. “After that, it's just unlucky. It's unfortunate. It goes off my stick. I'm just trying to keep it out of the net, obviously. It’s just a bad bounce.”
For the Oilers, it's just a bad bounce that shifts the whole energy of the series. If Edmonton had prevailed in overtime on Saturday, their 3–0 lead would have them cruising toward the conference final, even if their undefeated goalie stayed injured. But a 2–1 series is still anybody's to take—as the Oilers well remember from last round against the Kings, when they were the ones who came back from 2–0 down. What can you do after a play like this disrupts your wonderful win streak? Well, I guess just be thankful that it wasn't Game 7.
