Beckett Sennecke and Leo Carlsson scored 42 seconds apart in the third period, Mikael Granlund had a goal and two assists, and the Ducks celebrated their first home playoff game in eight years with a 7-4 victory over the Edmonton Oilers and a 2-1 series lead on Friday night.
Jeffrey Viel and Jackson LaCombe also scored in the third and Lukas Dostal made 20 saves for the upstart Ducks, who have poured in 16 goals in three games to take an early lead in this first-round series against the two-time Western Conference champion Oilers. Mason McTavish and Alex Killorn scored early goals.
Backed by a raucous sellout crowd hungry for Orange County’s first playoff hockey since 2018, the Ducks overcame their season-long defensive shortcomings by outscoring the powerhouse Oilers even after Connor McDavid recorded his first points of the series.
Game 4 is Sunday night at Honda Center.
McDavid had a power-play goal in the third period and an assist for Edmonton. Vasily Podkolzin, Kasperi Kapanen and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins also scored, and Connor Ingram stopped 32 shots.
Appropriately for a defense-deficient series, the Ducks capitalized on two transition sequences early in the third to take control.
Moments after Sennecke ripped a wrist shot for the tiebreaking goal and the precocious rookie’s first playoff point, Carlsson clinically finished a textbook 2-on-1 rush with Troy Terry.
McDavid trimmed the Oilers’ deficit with a fortunate deflection off Pavel Mintyukov’s stick, but the Oilers superstar short-circuited another power play later in the third by cross-checking Tyson Hinds.
Viel then flipped home a backhand with 3:03 left to cap a strong game by the Ducks’ fourth line, and LaCombe lofted home an empty-net goal all the way from the Ducks’ goal line to seal their first home playoff victory since May 14, 2017, in the conference finals against Nashville.
The clubs split the series’ first two games in Edmonton, but the Ducks demonstrated they could stay with the playoff-tested Oilers despite the obvious deficiencies of an inexperienced group that gave up more goals this season than any other playoff team.
The Ducks rode the wave of crowd energy and dominated play early in Game 3, putting 20 shots on Ingram in the first period. Killorn tied it for the Ducks in the second with his 39th career playoff goal.
Oilers forwards Adam Henrique and Jason Dickinson missed Game 3 with injuries.
