NHL Roundup: McDavid's Historic Night, Kochetkov's 10-0 Start and a Ducks Comeback for the Ages

Five games, and Sunday still found a way to overdeliver. This NHL roundup starts with McDavid's historic night at Madison Square Garden — Connor McDavid doing something faster than Wayne Gretzky ever did it — detours to Carolina for Kochetkov's 10th straight win to open a season and to Washington, where Kirill Kaprizov collected his 500th career point, and lands in Anaheim, where the Ducks authored a comeback for the ages: three goals down, six straight on the board. Even the quiet game on the schedule, in Philadelphia, had a returning star and a season high in goals. Here is how it all went down.

Start at Madison Square Garden, where the game was effectively announced in its first minute. McDavid scored on a coast-to-coast move 50 seconds into the Edmonton Oilers' 4-1 win over the New York Rangers, breezing past defenseman Vladislav Gavrikov and lifting his ninth goal of the season over Dylan Garand, according to Reuters / Field Level Media. It was McDavid's eighth career opening-minute goal, breaking a tie with Mark Messier for the most in Oilers history. He was not done. His secondary assist on Evan Bouchard's power-play goal at 9:49 of the second period extended two streaks at once — a season-opening point streak and a season-opening assist streak, both now at 15 games — and made him the fastest player in NHL history to reach 30 assists in a season. Gretzky needed 16 games to get there in 1984-85, a season he finished with 208 points. McDavid sits at 39 points through 15 games.

Colton Dach scored twice for Edmonton, and Matt Tomkins made 27 saves in his Oilers debut — his first NHL appearance since April 17, 2024 — earning the game's first star. Pavel Dorofeyev scored late for New York, ending Tomkins' shutout bid with 6:38 left, but the Rangers dropped their fourth straight and fell to 1-5-1 in their past seven. Edmonton, meanwhile, is 11-2-2, has won three in a row, and at 7-0-0 on the road has matched the 1983-84 team for the best road start in franchise history. The Oilers being perfect away from home while McDavid laps the record book is a combination the rest of the West should find genuinely worrying.

If McDavid's night was about speed, Pyotr Kochetkov's was about inevitability. Kochetkov stopped all 26 shots as the Carolina Hurricanes routed the Winnipeg Jets 7-0 in Raleigh, extending his season-opening winning streak to 10 games. Per NHL.com, he set a franchise record for the longest winning streak and became just the third goaltender in NHL history to win each of his first 10 games of a season, joining Jack Campbell (11 in 2020-21) and Carey Price (10 in 2016-17). It was his second shutout of the season and the 13th of his career, and the numbers underneath are just as loud: a 1.49 goals-against average and a .929 save percentage through 10 appearances, according to Reuters / Field Level Media. "We're super comfortable and confident with him back there," defenseman Sean Walker told NHL.com. "He makes it easy on the defense on a nightly basis."

Walker helped his own cause, scoring twice — including the short-handed opener at 5:16 of the first — while Juuso Valimaki, Sebastian Aho, Logan Stankoven, Mark Jankowski and Jesperi Kotkaniemi added one apiece. Carolina scored four times in a 7:14 span early in the second period; Winnipeg's Stuart Skinner was pulled at 9:09 of the second after allowing five goals, at a point when the Jets had managed only five shots. Carolina is 12-2-2, has won four straight and 12 of its past 14, and its 11-win October tied the NHL record for wins in that month. Winnipeg is the mirror image: 4-8-3, losers of nine straight (0-7-2). "It's pretty frustrating, pretty embarrassing as an organization," Jets coach Scott Arniel said, per NHL.com. The Jets finish their road trip Tuesday in Montreal, against a Canadiens team riding five straight wins. Good luck with that.

The afternoon game in Washington had its own milestone, and Minnesota wasted no time setting it up. Quinn Hughes scored at 3:42 and Michael McCarron at 5:27, and the Wild beat the Capitals 5-1 at Capital One Arena. Justin Sourdif cut it to 2-1 late in the second, but Maxim Shabanov's power-play goal with 2:23 left restored the cushion, and then came the moment: Kaprizov's empty-net goal at 19:02 of the third was the 500th point of his NHL career — 245 goals and 255 assists — making him the second player in Wild history to reach the mark after Mikko Koivu (709), per NHL.com. Kaprizov did it in 413 games, tying Evgeni Malkin as the fourth-fastest active player to 500, behind only McDavid, Sidney Crosby (369 games each) and Alex Ovechkin (373). The goal was also his league-leading 15th of the season. Danila Yurov added one 33 seconds later, Jesper Wallstedt made 26 saves, and Minnesota (10-3-3) has points in five straight. Washington's three-game winning streak is over.

And then there was Anaheim, where the game of the day looked finished after 20 minutes. Ottawa led 3-0 on goals from Philip Tomasino, Claude Giroux and Michael Amadio — three goals on the Senators' first seven shots. The Ducks, who had lost seven of eight, looked buried. Instead, Cutter Gauthier started the comeback at 1:35 of the second, Judd Caulfield scored at 3:33 and again on a power-play tip with 42 seconds left in the period to tie it 3-3, and Gauthier took over the third: a 5-on-3 one-timer at 1:50, another goal 36 seconds later to complete his second career hat trick, and a fourth straight Anaheim power-play goal from rookie Roger McQueen at 15:19 for the 6-3 final, per NHL.com. "The more I get pucks on the net, if they're not going in, they're creating good opportunities for my teammates and creating chaos," said Gauthier, who has five goals in his last two games. Leo Carlsson had three assists, Laurent Brossoit made 19 saves in his first start for Anaheim, and the Ducks went 4-for-5 on the power play. Ottawa (9-6-1) has lost three of four; Anaheim (6-7-1) finally has a night worth building on, and it heads to Vancouver on Tuesday to face a Canucks team fresh off putting five past Seattle.

The fifth game was Philadelphia's, and it doubled as a welcome-back party. Travis Konecny, who missed the previous 10 games with a lower-body injury, registered a goal and an assist in his return as the Flyers beat the Utah Mammoth 6-3, according to Reuters / Field Level Media. Christian Dvorak and Noah Cates each added a goal and an assist, Philadelphia set a season high for goals, beat Utah for the first time in five all-time meetings, and snapped a three-game losing streak. Logan Cooley had a goal and an assist for the Mammoth (9-6-0), who have alternated wins and losses over their last eight. The Flyers are still just 4-8-4 — but for one night, with their best winger back, they looked like a team with a pulse.

Monday keeps the marquee lit. The Vegas Golden Knights (9-5-1) open a four-game East Coast road trip at TD Garden against the Boston Bruins (10-4-1), first in the Atlantic, at 7 p.m. ET, per the Golden Knights' morning skate report on NHL.com. Mitch Marner brings a nine-game point streak into Boston, Jack Eichel leads Vegas with 20 points, and Mark Stone — five points from becoming the franchise's all-time scoring leader — faces the team from his home state, with Massachusetts natives Eichel and Noah Hanifin also coming home. Vegas lost 5-2 to New Jersey on Friday, so this is a response game as much as a road game. Colorado at Chicago headlines the rest of Monday's four-game slate. Sunday belonged to the record book. Monday in Boston might belong to Vegas — or to David Pastrnak, who leads the Bruins with 19 points. Either way, it is the game of the night.