Eight hundred games into his NHL career, Connor McDavid is somehow still finding new ways to make a milestone look routine. The Edmonton Oilers captain marked game No. 800 on Tuesday night with a goal and three assists, factoring in on every Edmonton goal in a 4-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings at Crypto.com Arena — a building the Oilers have turned into a second home at the Kings' expense.
The game was effectively decided in a first period that made no statistical sense. Los Angeles outshot Edmonton 11-7 in the opening frame and controlled long stretches of play — and went to the locker room down 3-0, because McDavid touched all three goals and Kings starter Darcy Kuemper touched almost nothing. Kuemper allowed three goals on seven shots and did not come back for the second period, replaced by Anton Forsberg, who made nine saves the rest of the way.
Three goals, one fingerprint
The sequence was a miniature of everything McDavid does. At 7:16 of the first, he found Leon Draisaitl, who redirected the pass short side past Kuemper for his fourth goal of the season. Barely a minute later, on a power play, McDavid's shot produced the rebound that Vasily Podkolzin tapped in for his sixth of the season. Then at 15:48, defenseman Ty Emberson launched a long flip pass that sprung McDavid alone, and the captain finished with a short-side backhand for his fourth goal of the year. Three goals in eight and a half minutes, three different ways — a setup, a created rebound, a breakaway finish — and the Kings' night was already over.
Los Angeles finally answered at 17:29 of the second period, when Brandt Clarke's point shot beat a screened Devon Levi for Clarke's first goal of the season. It was the Kings' only goal — the third straight game they have been held to one — and Podkolzin restored the three-goal cushion with an empty-netter at 17:42 of the third, from Draisaitl and McDavid, for his second of the night.
Levi stole the other 40 minutes
For all the first-period fireworks, Edmonton needed its goaltender to be the best player on the ice for the final two periods, and Devon Levi obliged. Levi made a career-high 39 saves on 40 shots — a .975 save percentage — improving to 4-0-0 on the season as the Kings poured on pressure that the scoreboard never reflected. The final shot count, 40-17 for Los Angeles, tells the real story of the night: the Oilers were clinical, and then they were rescued.
Levi was quick to deflect the praise toward the captain afterward, marveling at the way McDavid shows up the same way every single day. McDavid, for his part, credited Levi with holding the Oilers in the game, conceding the performance was far from a masterpiece but pointing to the good start and the result. Both were right. Edmonton scored on nearly a quarter of its shots; its goaltender stopped all but one of forty. That combination travels.
A historic start, by McDavid's own standards
McDavid's four-point night pushed his season-opening point streak to six games, with 17 points — four goals and 13 assists — that lead the NHL in scoring. Remarkably, it is the best start to a season of his career, which is saying something for a seven-time All-Star who has spent a decade redefining what a hot start looks like. Evan Bouchard added two assists on Tuesday and sits at 14 points; Draisaitl's goal and assist took him to 11. Edmonton's big three are, once again, occupying the top of the scoring race.
The team numbers are just as striking. At 5-0-1, the Oilers have points in all six games and remain the lone team in the NHL without a regulation loss. Tuesday's win completed a perfect three-game California road trip, extended their win streak to five, and kept them perfect on the road at 4-0-0. Podkolzin, meanwhile, has quietly become one of the season's best stories: two more goals Tuesday give him seven on the season, and he has points in all six games — the best streak of his career.
The Kings are in real trouble
The other side of the ice is a team searching for anything to grab onto. Los Angeles is 0-3-2, winless in five to open the season, and has scored one goal in each of its last three games. The effort metrics were there on Tuesday — 40 shots, a 58.2 percent faceoff advantage, long stretches of territorial control — and none of it mattered. Kings forward Trevor Moore said afterward that the belief remains inside the group, but was blunt that the results are nowhere near good enough and need to change fast.
There are, as Moore noted, a lot of games left. But five games without a win, a starting goaltender pulled after one period, and an offense that cannot buy a second goal is a hole that deepens quickly in the Pacific Division — especially when the team at the top of it is being dragged along by the best player in the world, playing the best season-opening hockey of his life.
Edmonton's win came on the same busy night for hockey on Previously, where the Golden Knights beat the Predators 5-2. Next up, the Oilers will try to keep the league's last unblemished regulation record intact — and McDavid, 800 games in, shows no sign of giving the rest of the league a turn.
