The Calgary Flames wasted absolutely no time getting on the board on Wednesday night in Game 1 of their second-round series with the Edmonton Oilers. They struck so fast that the Oilers had to call a timeout less than a minute in due to two goals having flown in before 60 seconds had elapsed. Despite that, though, the Oilers still made a whale of a game out of it, battling back from 3-0 down after six minutes-ish and 6-2 down to eventually tie the game early in the third period.
That wasn’t the end of the scoring unfortunately for them, as the Flames scored three more goals in the third to pull back away and win 9-6 in a classic affair between the two Canadian teams. Matthew Tkachuk scored a hat trick, and three of those came in the third period to seal the deal while Rasmus Andersson had a goal and two assists and Blake Coleman had two goals as well, all for the Flames. As for the Oilers, Connor McDavid had a goal and three assists as he valiantly fought to keep them in it. Elsewhere, the Carolina Hurricanes got their series with the New York Rangers off to a good start as well, winning 2-1 in overtime to take the 1-0 series advantage. Filip Chytil scored at 7:07 in the first period, and the Rangers held the lead until less than three minutes remained as Sebastian Aho found the net to force OT. Once in the extra period, the Hurricanes had all the momentum and took full use of it as Ian Cole scored 3:12 in to win it and send the home crowd away happy. The Hurricanes, despite being outplayed for large stretches here, remain undefeated at home in the playoffs.
