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Edmonton Oilers superstar center Connor McDavid lamented his team’s second-round playoff exit Sunday night, acknowledging, “I really feel like you’ve got to go through some of this to win.”

McDavid’s comments came in the wake of the Oilers’ 5-2 defeat to the Vegas Golden Knights in Game 6 of their Western Conference semifinal series.

McDavid and Warren Foegele both scored in the first period to give Edmonton an early 2-1 lead, only to watch Golden Knights forward Jonathan Marchessault net a second-period hat trick before an empty-net goal from William Karlsson officially ended the series.

“It feels like every team that wins and goes on a stretch of winning kind of experiences this,” McDavid said. “Obviously, it’s not what you want to do, not what you want to feel. That being said, I really feel that you’ve got to go through some of this to win. I think we’ve seen that all the way through. Let’s hope it’s the last time.”

The Oilers’ second-round exit comes a year after they reached the Western Conference finals for the first time since the 2005-06 season. Even though they were swept by the eventual Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche, the fact they made it to the conference final crystalized the belief that the Oilers are in a championship window.

The attack-minded Oilers averaged the most goals per game while also boasting the NHL’s top power-play unit. Those elements proved significant at times in the regular season, when the Oilers needed copious scoring to overcome the inconsistencies they encountered with either their defensive structure or their goaltending.

Eventually, the Oilers found continuity with rookie goaltender Stuart Skinner overtaking free agent signing Jack Campbell in net. The Oilers were also aggressive at the trade deadline by adding hulking forward Nick Bjugstad along with acquiring top-four defenseman Mattias Ekholm to address their defensive concerns.

“Obviously, when you start the season, you’re in it to win it and we’re at that stage. If you don’t complete that, then, it just feels like a failure or a wasted year almost.”

Leon Draisaitl

It led to Edmonton finishing the regular season with one of the NHL’s strongest records after the trade deadline. The Oilers finished second in the Pacific Division and opened the postseason by beating the Los Angeles Kings in six games.

The early stages of the second round did show promising signs. Even though they lost Game 1, superstar forward Leon Draisaitl scored four goals, an effort that was then followed by Draisaitl scoring two more in a series-tying victory in Game 2.

Edmonton and Vegas swapped wins going into Game 5, which the Golden Knights won 4-3 at home. Vegas then wrapped up the series in Edmonton on Sunday night.

“Yeah, it hurts. It’s tough to find words right now,” an emotional Draisaitl said. “Obviously, when you start the season, you’re in it to win it and we’re at that stage. If you don’t complete that, then, it just feels like a failure or a wasted year almost. So, it hurts.”

Heading into the offseason, Edmonton general manager Ken Holland and his front office staff will have a number of items to address. Even with most of their core already in place — Draisaitl and McDavid are among a slew of players who will have more than two years left on their contract at the start of the 2022-23 season — there are still financial decisions that must be made. CapFriendly projects the Oilers will have less than $6 million in available cap space.

Mattias Janmark, Derek Ryan and Bjugstad are among the pending unrestricted free agents who need a new contract, while Evan Bouchard, Klim Kostin and Ryan McLeod are among those pending restricted free agents who will also seek a new deal.

But as the second-round loss to the Knights showed, the Oilers could be prompted to alter their roster to avoid a similar fate next year. One of the challenges the Oilers encountered in their second-round defeats was the lack of secondary and tertiary scoring.

Foegele was the only Oilers player outside of Draisaitl and McDavid to score in those four losses.

“Every single person in this room prepared, tried to give everything that they had, and we weren’t able to produce at the same level 5-on-5 as Vegas was,” Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse said. “That comes down to each and every guy. We did produce a lot in the regular season and we’re a really good 5-on-5 team. I think on a team and personal level, we could have been better. It stings now.”

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Rays’ 8-run comeback largest in MLB this season

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Rays' 8-run comeback largest in MLB this season

TAMPA, Fla. — The Tampa Bay Rays overcame an eight-run deficit to beat the Baltimore Orioles 12-8 on Wednesday night in the largest comeback in the majors this season.

Tampa Bay matched the biggest comeback in franchise history. The Rays also rallied from eight down in a 10-8 victory over the Los Angeles Angels on Aug. 18, 2012, and in a 10-9 win over the Toronto Blue Jays on July 25, 2009.

It tied the Orioles’ largest blown lead over the past 50 seasons. Baltimore last gave away an eight-run lead on April 28, 2017, against the New York Yankees. The Orioles led that game 9-1 entering the bottom of the sixth inning before losing 14-11 in 10 innings.

Baltimore had an eight-run second inning on Wednesday. Colton Cowser smacked a three-run home run, Cedric Mullins added a solo shot, Gunnar Henderson had an RBI single and Ramón Laureano hit a three-run homer.

Tampa Bay’s Christopher Morel hit an RBI double in the third, and Jake Mangum‘s two-run single cut it to 8-3. Curtis Mead hit a two-out triple in the fourth and scored on a Junior Caminero single. Brandon Lowe‘s two-run homer in the fifth made it 8-8. And Jonathan Aranda had a two-run single in the Rays’ four-run seventh.

Lowe has at least a hit and a run in seven consecutive games, the longest active streak of its kind in the majors. He is batting .464 (13-of-28) with two home runs, five RBIs and eight runs during that span.

Caminero had four hits and two RBIs for the Rays.

Entering Wednesday, teams were 0-134 when trailing by eight or more runs at any point this season.

“It’s a tough game,” Orioles manager Tony Mansolino said. “It really hurts. But tomorrow, we’ll have to bounce back and try to figure out how to win a game.”

Three teams came back from eight runs behind last season in the majors. Pittsburgh was the most recent team to rally from more than that, erasing a nine-run deficit in a 13-12 victory over the Cincinnati Reds on Nov. 23, 2023.

ESPN Research and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Yanks finally score, otherwise sputter in latest loss

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Yanks finally score, otherwise sputter in latest loss

NEW YORK — The good news for the Yankees on Wednesday was they scored a run after 30 consecutive scoreless innings. The bad news was they again didn’t score enough to win.

The Yankees fell to the Los Angeles Angels 3-2 to extend their season-high losing streak to six games. The Angels will look to complete a four-game sweep Thursday afternoon at Yankee Stadium. The Yankees, whose lead in the AL East has shrunk to 1½ games, will look to emerge from an offensive funk that has produced seven runs in seven games.

“That’s baseball,” Yankees right fielder Aaron Judge said. “We know what we signed up for. You’re going to play 162. You’re going to hit a little rut like this, but you can’t give up. You can’t mope about it. You just got to show up the next day and you got to be ready to play.”

Jazz Chisholm Jr. ended the Yankees’ scoreless innings streak in the second inning with a moonshot solo home run down the right-field line, giving New York its first run since the ninth inning Saturday against the Boston Red Sox. Two innings later, Cody Bellinger launched another solo shot to give the Yankees their first lead since last Thursday when they defeated the Kansas City Royals 1-0.

But the Yankees mustered only one other hit — a ground ball from Bellinger in the sixth inning that was ruled a single after it bounced off Trent Grisham as he ran to second base for the inning’s second out. Yankees manager Aaron Boone said he believed his team’s at-bats Wednesday were better than they were Tuesday — when he said he noticed his players pressing — and pointed to four walks as progress.

But the Yankees went 0-for-3 with runners in scoring position and are 5-for-48 (.104) with 12 strikeouts, four walks and three RBIs in such situations over their past seven games.

“We just got to break through now like we’re capable of offensively,” Boone said.

Judge, the two-time AL MVP who is a heavy favorite to win a third this season, has gone 1-for-19 with 11 strikeouts, two intentional walks and a home run over the past five games. He went 0-for-4 on Wednesday with two strikeouts, a 94.7 mph groundout and 107.9 mph flyout.

“Guys are pitching, they’re doing their job,” Judge said. “Sometimes we’re faltering on doing our job. But it’s tough to say. I think it just comes down to us not executing, us not doing our job. Maybe a little passive in certain situations. But all we can do is show up tomorrow ready to go.”

The Angels broke through to retake the lead in the eighth inning Wednesday without a hit when, after three walks, shortstop Anthony Volpe mishandled a ground ball on what should’ve been a routine, inning-ending double play. Volpe, a Gold Glove winner in 2023, was charged with his ninth error of the season, the second most among shortstops across the majors.

“Right off the bat, I got to be aggressive, go get the ball, make the play,” Volpe said. “As far as that, that’s all it is. It’s the first read off the bat.”

The lack of execution trickled to the offensive side in the bottom of the inning. The Yankees appeared ready to mount a rally when Jasson Dominguez walked and Oswald Peraza was hit by a pitch to begin the inning. But they were left stranded as Grisham, who was given the green light to swing away with one strike after failing to drop down a bunt, popped out, before Judge flied out and Bellinger popped out to extinguish the threat.

“When we’re not scoring a lot of runs, we got to execute on the highest level on the little things,” Boone said. “And we haven’t done that this week a handful of times when we had some opportunities.”

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Singer defied Dodgers, belted anthem in Spanish

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Singer defied Dodgers, belted anthem in Spanish

Latin singer Nezza said that she is “super proud” of performing the national anthem in Spanish at Dodger Stadium on Saturday night and that she has “no regrets.”

Her surprising 90-second rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” before the Los Angeles Dodgers‘ game against the Giants — and a behind-the-scenes video she shared on social media of team representatives discouraging it beforehand — quickly went viral. It has become a flashpoint for Dodgers fans frustrated by the team’s lack of vocal support for immigrant communities impacted by the deportation raids across the U.S., including numerous neighborhoods in and around Los Angeles.

“This is my moment to show everyone that I am with them, that we have a voice and with everything that’s happening it’s not OK,” Nezza, 30, told The Associated Press. “I’m super proud that I did it. No regrets.”

Nezza said she hadn’t yet decided whether to sing in English or Spanish until she walked out onto the field and saw the stands filled with Latino families in Dodger Blue. Before that, as shown in the singer’s TikTok video, a Dodgers employee had told Nezza, “We are going to do the song in English today, so I’m not sure if that wasn’t transferred or if that wasn’t relayed.”

The Spanish-language version Nezza sang, “El Pendón Estrellado,” is the official translation of the national anthem and was commissioned in 1945 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt from Peruvian American composer Clotilde Arias.

Nezza says her manager immediately received a call from an unidentified Dodgers employee saying their clients were not welcome at the stadium again, but the team denied that in a statement to the AP.

“There were no consequences or hard feelings from the Dodgers regarding her performance,” the Dodgers said in the statement. “She was not asked to leave. We would be happy to have her back.”

Despite the Dodgers’ statement, Nezza said she does not think she will return to the stadium but said she hopes her performance will inspire others to use their voice and speak out.

“It’s just shown me, like, how much power there is in the Latin community,” Nezza said. “We’ve got to be the voice right now.”

The Dodgers have not gone on the record regarding the arrests and raids made by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in the areas just a short drive from Dodger Stadium, but player Enrique Hernández posted about it on Instagram over the weekend.

“I am saddened and infuriated by what’s happening in our country and our city,” Hernández posted in English and Spanish. “I cannot stand to see our community being violated, profiled, abused and ripped apart. ALL people deserve to be treated with respect, dignity and human rights.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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