EDMONTON — The ‘A’ cliché at this time of year is a true hockeyism: Your best players have to be your best players.
So when Connor McDavid goes pointless, yet you win for the first time this season when the captain posted zeroes; when you get the October version of Evan Bouchard instead of the June version; when your power play doesn’t fire and the entire top line goes pointless — yet you still beat the Anaheim Ducks 4-3 in Game 1 of a playoff series — you’ve got to feel like the Edmonton Oilers stole one to open their 2026 playoff run.
The solution to a slow night from the superstars?
How about two goals each from winger Kasperi Kapanen and third line centre Jason Dickinson, as the playoffs began with a depth win for an Oilers team that so often leans on their big boys in games like these.
“Your top players have to be your top players,” said Leon Draisaitl, “but you're not going anywhere if you don't have guys like that chipping in. We don't expect two goals from guys like that every night, of course. But you need that.”
Like Draisaitl, who missed the final 14 games of the season but chipped in two assists in Game 1, Dickinson hopped off the trainer’s table to play against Anaheim after missing the final three games of the season.
He scored off a lovely breakaway pass from Jake Walman (two assists) — a third-pairing defenceman who was better than most of the guys above him in the lineup — and then banged in the tying goal, charging to the net to collect a rebound off a Mattias Ekholm shot.
Kapanen snapped home a deft feed from Vasily Podkolzin to break the tie with 1:54 to play, his second of the night. It sealed a win on a pointless night for McDavid, the first time Edmonton has pulled that off all season long (0-12-2).
“It’s super important,” Kapanen said of some depth scoring in Game 1. “Teams are going to play extra hard on (McDavid) and double coverage him, and other guys need to step up.”
Usually, the “other guys” wear numbers like 29, 18, 2 and 93. But on this night, it was Kapanen and Dickinson who had the jump, proving out hockey’s other mainstay cliché: They don’t ask how, they just ask how many.
“Connor is going to get his chances and get his looks, and we're not worried about that,” Kapanen said. “But that was just, kind of, me and Dickie scoring a couple goals tonight, just very important for this team. And other guys stepping up and making big defensive plays that you don't really see on the highlight reel, but that are just as important.”
Add to that a goalie who gave Edmonton the big save at the right moment, as Connor Ingram stoned big centre Leo Carlsson in alone seconds before Kapanen’s winner. It was an early series-changer, the kind of save Oilers fans have longed for.
“Another big game from him,” said head coach Kris Knoblauch. “One goal they got was a deflection off the hip of one of our defencemen. (Another was) a rebound goal. He made a huge save with five minutes left (Carlsson) and the last one in the last few seconds, an empty net...I think Ekky made the save.”
It was Ingram’s first career playoff win, after playing four games for Nashville in ’22.
“Yeah, took me four tries, bro. Thank you,” he joked with reporters. “No, it means a lot. It's been cool, a wild year. I hit 100 games, 50 wins, things like that.”
On Monday, Ingram walked out of the tunnel into a raging Rogers Place in all its playoff glory, one of the great moments in the career of any NHL player. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’ve done, that’s a moment that raises the hair on the back of even the most grizzled neck.
“It was awesome,” marvelled Ingram. “The bulk of my career I played out of Mullett Arena (in Tempe, Arizona), so to walk out that tunnel today, it’s a different animal. It’s loud in there. It was fun. After the anthem, I usually smile and take it all in.
“That was one today where I was like ‘this is cool.’”
That’s not what the Ducks were saying, as they walked out into a spring night knowing they’d let a big opportunity slip away.
They erased a 2-0 first-period lead with a three-goal second, and held that 3-2 lead with eight minutes to play. On a night where they shut down the vaunted Oilers power play — and the best player in the world — Anaheim still got the ol’ ham sandwich.
Now, you just know the Oilers will only get harder to beat.
“It was just not our game. Too many turnovers, not hard enough on pucks,” Draisaitl said of the second period. He had two assists but has much, much more in his bag than he showed in Game 1. “I felt OK. It’s certainly going to take a couple of games to really be myself and really trust myself again.”
OIL SPILLS — Adam Henrique left the game in Period 1 and did not return. No news from the coach, but we’re expecting Josh Samanski in the Oilers’ Game 2 lineup.
