McDavid leads Oilers past Bedard, Blackhawks

EDMONTON, Alberta — Connor McDavid had two assists and the streaking Edmonton Oilers overcame an early goal by rookie Connor Bedard to beat the Chicago Blackhawks 4-1 on Tuesday night in the first NHL matchup between the young stars.

McDavid, a three-time MVP, was the No. 1 draft pick in 2015. Bedard was selected first this past summer.

“The first (period) was not bad, but when you kind of keep it a track meet against them it’s obviously hard with those guys,” Bedard said. “We created a bit and I thought it wasn’t terrible, but definitely some things to clean up.”

Sam Gagner had a goal and an assist in the highly anticipated “Clash of the Connors,” helping the Oilers (13-12-1) win their eighth game in a row. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Leon Draisaitl and Zach Hyman also scored for Edmonton, and defenseman Evan Bouchard added a pair of assists.

“Anytime you win it is fun, and it is fun doing it the right way, with the goals against and limiting chances and things like that,” Hyman said. “That’s the key to success and is something we have harped on and is the reason we are on this little run.”

Stuart Skinner made 22 saves for his seventh consecutive victory in net.

“I’ve seen him be able to absorb the spotlight and put any distractions behind him,” Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch said. “From what I’ve seen here, he looks like an elite goalie. I can see why he had the season he did last year and he’s come up with some really big saves for us during this stretch.”

Bedard gave the banged-up Blackhawks (9-18-1) a 1-0 lead with his 12th goal 3:21 into the first period, but Chicago lost its seventh consecutive road game.

The 18-year-old center scored on the second shot of the night. He took a long pass from Alex Vlasic for a partial breakaway and unleashed a deceptive shot that beat Skinner glove-side to the top corner.

“He made a really nice move, a very quick release,” Skinner said. “He placed it really well, too. It’s pretty hard to move it that fast and still pick a corner.”

Another top overall draft pick tied the game midway through the opening period as Nugent-Hopkins took a saucer pass on a give-and-go with McDavid and beat Blackhawks goalie Petr Mrazek for his sixth of the season.

McDavid extended his point streak to 10 games, and Bouchard got the secondary assist to stretch his point streak to 12 games. It is the second-longest run by a defenseman in Oilers history.

Edmonton took the lead with 1:41 to play in the first as Derek Ryan sent a backhand pass from behind the net to Gagner, who chipped it in for his fourth goal.

The Oilers got a gift with 6:36 remaining in the second when Chicago defender Nikita Zaitsev deflected Draisaitl’s pass into his own net. The goal was Draisaitl’s 12th of the season.

Edmonton made it 4-1 just 43 seconds into the third with a power-play goal. Hyman had an easy tap-in of a perfectly placed feed from McDavid for his 16th goal.

“I thought we did a pretty good job,” Blackhawks coach Luke Richardson said. “If you take the goal that went in off of Zaitsev’s stick and you take away their power-play goal, I thought we were right in that game.”