Nobody Can Score on Oettinger, Stankoven's First Hat Trick, and the Undefeated Ducks Hit Winnipeg: Friday's NHL Roundup

Nobody can score on Jake Oettinger right now. Logan Stankoven just had the first hat trick of his career in Carolina's 7-2 rout. And the NHL's only undefeated team — the Anaheim Ducks — walks into Winnipeg on Friday night for the best game of the weekend's first slate. Thursday's 10-game night is in the books, and the scores are all here. This is what they actually taught us.

Lesson one: the crease is king this week

Let's start with the obvious one, because it's staring everyone in the face. Jake Oettinger stopped all 26 Buffalo shots on Thursday for his second straight shutout — he blanked San Jose 5-0 on Monday. Two starts, 50-plus saves, zero goals against. Dallas finally got its first power-play goal of the season Thursday too (its 10th opportunity), but it didn't need it. Dallas is 2-2-0 and looks like a team that's been waiting for its goalie to be ready. He's ready.

And it wasn't just Dallas. Linus Ullmark turned away 29 of 30 as Ottawa edged Philadelphia 2-1 on Carter Yakemchuk's late power-play goal. Juuse Saros was the entire reason Nashville survived Montreal — 32 saves while the Predators clawed back from a 2-0 deficit to win 5-2, with Ryan O'Reilly's power-play deflection with 3:16 left as the winner and Adam Edstrom adding two empty-netters. In Tampa, Dennis Hildeby stopped 34 shots in his first start as a Bolt and John Carlson scored his first two goals in a Lightning sweater in the 3-2 win over Minnesota. On Long Island, Ilya Sorokin carried a shutout deep into the third and finished with 22 saves in the Islanders' 4-1 win over Chicago — he's allowed one goal total in two home starts.

It's one week. But patterns are patterns, and the pattern is that the teams with settled goaltending are banking points while everyone else plays "maybe the third goalie works." October hockey is won in the crease, and the league's best nets are already separating.

Lesson two: the power play is a cheat code right now

Boston went 3-for-4 on the power play and held Utah to 0-for-7 in a 6-1 rout, and every single one of the Bruins' five goal-scorers — Pastrnak (two goals, two assists), Morgan Geekie (1G, 2A), Matt Poitras (1G, 1A), Casey Mittelstadt, Mason Lohrei — entered the night without a goal this season. That's not a coincidence, that's a team getting its looks in the right places. Jeremy Swayman made 36 saves at the other end, but this was the Bruins' man advantage reminding everyone why last year's playoff run had juice.

Carolina's power play hit twice in the first period through Andrei Svechnikov, Dallas ended its season-opening drought, and Tampa Bay ended an 0-for-14 season-opening drought of its own when Carlson one-timed a Kucherov pass home. Even Nashville's comeback turned on two power-play goals, including O'Reilly's game-winner. October defenses are still sorting themselves out. If your power play is already humming, you're playing a different sport than everyone else.

Lesson three: the bad teams are telling on themselves

Philadelphia is 0-3-2. The Flyers had been outscored by double digits coming into Thursday, hung around Ottawa into the late third, and still lost 2-1 — and lost winger William Eklund to an injury in the first period (helped off, did not return). There's effort there, which is the worst kind of bad: close enough to believe, not close enough to matter.

Vancouver's in the middle of a six-game road trip and opened it by getting stomped 7-2 in Raleigh — three straight wins now for the Hurricanes, who are defending a Cup and look completely unbothered. The Canucks' Kevin Lankinen got pulled after two periods (12 saves on 18 shots) while Leevi Merilainen stopped 15 of 16 in relief. Jake DeBrusk scored twice in a losing cause, which is about the whole story for Vancouver right now: a couple of good shifts, no resistance.

And Vegas, because of course Vegas

The Knights fell behind 3-1 in the first period to Toronto at T-Mobile Arena — Mitch Marner, back in the building where he used to be the visiting villain, doing visiting-villain things — and then won 4-3 in the shootout anyway. That's two straight weeks of Vegas refusing to lose games it has no business winning, and it should be said plainly: this team treats a two-goal deficit like a suggestion. The full shootout story is here, and it's worth your time.

Colorado deserves a nod too: 7-3 in Calgary, Cale Makar with two goals in his hometown, Devon Toews with two of his own, Nathan MacKinnon with a goal and two assists, and Scott Wedgewood making 26 saves in his 200th career game. The Avs are 3-1-0 and scoring in bunches. Nobody's worried about the back-to-back when the back end of the lineup scores like that.

And San Jose keeps living past regulation: Darnell Nurse scored 1:03 into overtime to beat St. Louis 3-2, the Sharks' third overtime win in their first four games. Nobody wants to play them right now — not because they're dominant, but because they absolutely refuse to go away.

Tonight: Ovi's farewell tour meets Broadway, and the last unbeaten team faces its test

Rangers at Capitals, 7 ET, NHL Network. This is the one. New York is 4-1-0 and rolling, but Joe Veleno is on injured reserve and rookie Cole Beaudoin has been recalled from Hartford for his NHL debut — so there's a kid playing his first NHL game in a rivalry building on national TV. Washington is 2-1-0, and this is the Capitals' first real spotlight night of Alex Ovechkin's announced final season — his 22nd. His sons introduced him before the 5-3 home-opening win over Pittsburgh on October 7, Tom Wilson had three points in that one, and now the Rangers come to town. The one worry: defenseman Matt Roy left the Tampa game with a lower-body injury and was considered unlikely for the home opener, so Washington's blue line is thinner than it wants to be against a 4-1-0 team. Every Ovechkin game this year is an event. This one's an event with stakes.

Ducks at Jets, 8 ET, ESPN+. Anaheim is the NHL's only undefeated team, which is a sentence nobody had on their preseason bingo card, and Leo Carlsson is playing like a guy who heard every doubter. Winnipeg is 3-0-1 without Connor Hellebuyck, who's suspended — the Jets are proving they can win with structure and depth, which was always the question. Kyle Connor has five goals in four games. The concern: Josh Morrissey suffered an upper-body injury Wednesday, and losing your number-one defenseman against the league's hottest young team is not the trade you want to make. Undefeated vs. the team that keeps winning anyway — this is Friday's best game on paper, and it's not close.

Penguins at Blue Jackets, 7 ET. Pittsburgh is 1-1-1 and still figuring out what this season is — Columbus is the kind of place that punishes teams still figuring things out. Keep an eye on whether the Jackets' young legs can run the Penguins' veterans into the ice late.

Kraken at Red Wings, 7 ET. Seattle visits Detroit, and both of these teams need October points badly — neither is built to chase in March. Detroit's home ice has been kind; Seattle's road legs are the question.