Connor McDavid produces magic, but a Mike Smith mistake proves costly: 5 Oilers observations

Mike Smith did the only logical thing he could do after making an egregious error. He simply owned it.

“I was just trying to make something happen,” he said. “Obviously, just trying to do too much there. In a tight game like that, you can’t afford to make mistakes like that. It ended up costing us the game.”

The Oilers goaltender made a ghastly decision with a little more than five minutes left in the third period with the score tied.

Corralling a Kings dump-in, Smith surveyed his options, took his time, and then proceeded to throw the puck up the middle of the ice.

It was intercepted by Alex Iafallo, which led to all-out mayhem in the Oilers’ zone. Iafallo turned, fired, and hit the post. Phillip Danault’s chance just missed with Evan Bouchard more in a position to play goalie than Smith.

It looked, for a moment, like the Oilers survived a scare. That moment was brief. Trevor Moore picked up the loose puck and passed it back to the point where defenceman Sean Durzi was waiting. Durzi’s shot deflected off Danault for the game-winning goal. The Kings took the opening game of the series 4-3.

“You can’t do anything about it now,” Smith said. “It’s over. It didn’t go the way we wanted it to.

“It’s a long series. It’s a long playoffs if you want to get to where we want to go. It’s adversity early in the series, but it’s nothing we haven’t dealt with before and I’m sure we’ll have to deal with it again on the journey here.”

Smith’s gaffe was clearly the difference in a game the Oilers deserved to win 76.6 percent of the time, per MoneyPuck.

“Obviously, Mike would like to have that puckhandle back, but there was other stuff on that play, too, we can handle a little bit better,” Oilers coach Jay Woodcroft said.

Not only that but there were other things that stuck out, too.

This is what we learned from the Oilers’ seventh straight playoff loss and eighth in their last ninth games.

Can’t stop the rush

Smith’s gaffe on the game-winner wasn’t the only example of him not playing well. He looked shaky throughout, and the Kings’ third goal by Brendan Lemieux off an odd-man rush also had an aroma to it.

That Lemieux goal was one of many rush chances against, something the Oilers had done a much better job of cleaning up since Woodcroft was promoted on Feb. 10.

“Forwards needed to do a better job coming back and allowing the D to stand and make it hard to get into our zone,” Connor McDavid said.

“In the end, we made some mistakes we haven’t made over the last two months or so,” Woodcroft said. “There’s areas we can clean up for sure.”

Match game

Woodcroft said before the game that he wasn’t going to be beholden to any hard-match game that his mentor Todd McLellan would try to push. Early in the game, he appeared to backtrack on that stance.

It was clear McLellan wanted Danault against McDavid and Anze Kopitar lined up opposite Leon Draisaitl. Woodcroft went so far to avoid the matchup that he skipped McDavid’s line through a rotation, instead putting out Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and his mates, when McLellan put out Danault for an offensive zone faceoff.

Woodcroft put in McDavid after Danault had changed and when the puck got into the offensive zone. But a quick whistle provided an opportunity for McLellan to send Danault over the boards again, which he did.

“You’re going to expect that from L.A.,” McDavid said. “They’re a team that wants to get their matchups, and Todd’s always been a matchup guy. We understand that and we’re comfortable playing against anybody.”

Eventually, Woodcroft got more of his way. McDavid played 3:21 against Danault at five-on-five and 7:52 against Kopitar. Woodcroft had the benefit of last change and used his 11-forward, seven-defenceman scheme to move his captain onto different lines.

“It was an interesting game with minutes’ distribution,” Woodcroft said. “They had some people who didn’t play a whole heck of a lot.

“When that stuff happens, you’re just trying to get people on the ice and make sure we’re using enough people to spread the minutes out so you’re not overtaxing somebody.”

Waiting for Jesse

No forward played less than Jesse Puljujarvi, who clocked in at 7:52 with no time on special teams. The Big Finn wasn’t effective either.

The Oilers were in the red in shots, attempts, and goals (2-0) when he was on the ice. His ice time will be something to monitor as this series progresses.

Puljujarvi didn’t get any chances as the net-front guy on the power play. He missed shifts with McDavid and Evander Kane in favour of Zack Kassian. He got time lower down in the lineup with Derek Ryan and Warren Foegele when he was passed through the bottom six. He played just 12 shifts.

Of course, it’s only one game, but it’s part of a larger trend.

Puljujarvi had four goals and 13 points in his last 37 games to end the regular season. That’s not to say he didn’t have value; he had a 70 percent goal share at five-on-five.

Based on Game 1, you have to wonder if the coaching staff is losing confidence in him.

Big Yamo

As one right winger struggled, another shone. Kailer Yamamoto played one of his best NHL games on Monday.

Yamamoto had a second-unit power-play goal when he tipped in a pass from Duncan Keith and added a first-unit power-play assist.

At five-on-five, he was dogged on the forecheck, made two hits and was a handful in the offensive zone.

“He does a lot of work for other people,” Woodcroft said last week. “Because he does, he’s a popular request as a linemate.”

Not only that but he was used on both McDavid’s and Draisaitl’s wings to fill in for the underused Puljujarvi.

“He was very good,” Woodcroft said. “He won a lot of puck battles, went to hard areas. He brings what he brings, and he was a good player for us.”

A McDavid moment

It wasn’t even a postgame talking point because of the way the Oilers lost. But, man, what a goal McDavid scored.

The Oilers were down 2-0. They had very little going for them. The Kings were trapping, yet McDavid just picked them apart. He made Olli Maatta look like a pylon and Jordan Spence nothing but a screen.

McDavid was flying all night and that goal got his team back in the game in the last minute of the first period. Yamamoto tied it up a couple of minutes into the second.

It could have served as a turning point in a comeback win. Instead, two lousy goals allowed by Smith — mainly the dreadful game-winner — are what this game will be remembered for.

(Top photo: Codie McLachlan / Getty Images)