Nikita Kucherov had two goals and two assists to move two points ahead of Connor McDavid for the league scoring lead as the Tampa Bay Lightning won their third game in a row, defeating the Edmonton Oilers 5-2 on Saturday.
Anthony Cirelli had a pair of goals and Jake Guentzel also scored for the Lightning (43-21-4) who have won four of their last five.
Connor McDavid and Josh Samanski replied for the Oilers (34-28-9) who have lost two straight and missed out on a glorious opportunity to entrench themselves in the playoff race with most of their key rivals also losing earlier in the day.
The Oilers remained without star forward Leon Draisaitl, out for the rest of the regular season with a lower-body injury.
Andrei Vasilevskiy recorded 25 saves to earn the win in the Tampa net, while Connor Ingram made 22 stops for Edmonton.
Takeaways
Lightning: Kucherov has been nothing short of stellar of late with 12 points in his last three games and 22 points in his last eight contests. In 29 games in the 2026 calendar year, he has logged 67 points, 20 more than McDavid. Kucherov now has 37 points in 20 games against Edmonton.
Oilers: McDavid remains just shy of three milestones. He is now one goal from 400 in his career, one assist from 800 and two points short of 1,200.
Key moment
The Lightning went up 3-1 with three minutes remaining in the second period as Kucherov emerged from the penalty box at the end of the first half of an Edmonton five-on-three advantage and J.J. Moser sprung him on a short-handed breakaway which he converted for his 39th of the season and his first career short-handed marker.
Weird one
Edmonton got a bizarre goal on a play where they didn’t even shoot the puck with 12:44 to play in the third period. The teams were fighting for the puck along the sideboards when it was dug out by Tampa’s Oliver Bjorkstrand toward his own net and then hit the stick of Emil Lilleberg and trickled past Vasilevskiy. The goal was credited to rookie Samanski for his first career NHL goal.
Key stat
Between them, the Lightning (three times) and the Oilers (twice) have appeared in five of the last six Stanley Cup finals.
Up next
Lightning: Visit the Calgary Flames on Sunday.
Oilers: Visit the Utah Mammoth on Tuesday.
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