For the second straight year, the Edmonton Oilers ended the LA Kings season in the first round, this time in game six.

Goal Breakdown

First period:

EDM: Connor McDavid (3), ASST: Evan Bouchard (7), Mattias Ekholm (4)

LAK: Sean Durzi (1), ASST: Kevin Fiala (4), Quinton Byfield (3)

EDM: Klim Kostin (2), ASST: Ryan McLeod (2), Vincent Desharnais (1)

Second period: 

EDM: PP Leon Draisaitl (7), ASST: Connor McDavid (7), Evan Bouchard (8)

LAK: PP Adrian Kempe (5), ASST: Kevin Fiala (5), Viktor Arvidsson (5)

LAK: PP Kevin Fiala (1), ASST: Drew Doughty (3), Viktor Arvidsson (6)

EDM: Klim Kostin (3), ASST: Kailer Yamamoto (1), Vincent Desharnais (2)

Third period:

LAK: SH Phillip Danault (2), ASST: None

EDM: Kailer Yamamoto (1), ASST: Ryan McLeod (3), Klim Kostin (1)

Stats:

Goals:

EDM: 5

LAK: 4

Shots: 

EDM: 26

LAK: 44

Power-plays:

EDM: 1/2

LAK: 2/3

Here are the takeaways from the season-ending loss:

– Season over

The LA Kings season came to an end at the hands of the Edmonton Oilers for the second straight year. This year has to be more disappointing than last year as this Kings team was better on paper than last year’s team who took the Oilers to seven games. However, the Oilers got better this year at the trade deadline, just like the Kings. Nick Bjugstad and Mattias Ekholm were two excellent pickups by general manager Ken Holland as the Oilers look to go all the way this year. Getting close isn’t good enough in this league. It’s time to take that next step and this offseason will be huge for the hockey club as holes on the roster remain (third-line center, left-handed defenseman, and goalie). Game four will be the game that got away in this series.

-Penalty kill was horrendous

There is bad penalty killing, and then there is awful penalty killing. The Kings fell into the latter. The Edmonton Oilers had the best power play during the regular season, converting at 32.4%. When you see Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Zach Hyman, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, and Evan Bouchard, on the first unit you can see why that power play is lethal. The penalty kill was an issue in last year’s first-round series as the Kings’ penalty kill was 12/19 (63.2%), allowing seven power-play goals. In this series, it got worse as the penalty kill was 7/16 (43.8%), allowing nine power-play goals. Any time the Oilers went on the man advantage it felt like an automatic goal. Can’t give a team like the Oilers those opportunities because they will make you pay, which they did.

Look at how open that cross-ice pass is.

– Turnovers and own zone coverage

Remember when the Kings had issues keeping the puck out of their net early in the season? Well, it came back to haunt them last night. Joonas Korpisalo was outstanding in the first three games and was a huge reason why the Kings were up 2-1 in the series. As the series went on, he gave up some rough goals, which happens because every goalie gives them up and can’t get a shutout every game they play in. While his numbers didn’t look great last night, you really can’t fault him on four, maybe all five of the goals. Two goals he got screened on, one was off an own-zone turnover, one was an easy tip-in for McDavid, and the other one was a power-play goal that he had no chance of stopping. Turnovers were still an issue in the first three games, but Korpisalo bailed them out. Unfortunately, if you play with fire you’ll get burned, and the Kings found out the hard way.

+ Kempe scores his fifth

Adrain Kempe finished the series as LA’s leading scorer with eight points (5-3). With the Kings trailing by two goals in the middle frame, Kempe got the Kings within one as he snapped a shot from the right circle high glove on Stuart Skinner. The goal was Kempe’s fifth of the series, second on the power play, and it got the crowd back into it.

+ Power play has a huge series

The special teams were an absolute problem for the Kings all of last year. While the penalty kill didn’t get better at all, the power play took a huge step forward. For the series, the Kings went 7/21 (33.3%) on the power play, a huge difference from last year’s 12.5% in their first-round series against Edmonton. While their power-play percentage wasn’t as high as the Oilers, 33.3% is no slouch. Adrian Kempe and Kevin Fiala gave the Kings timely power-play goals in game six to give the Kings a chance.

It appears that Jim Hiller might as well have been the best assistant coaching hire in the offseason. He’s done a tremendous job coaching the power play.

UP NEXT: An interesting offseason awaits!

Featured image credit: NHL.com

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