ARLINGTON, Texas — Ryan Nugent-Hopkins scored a pair of quick power-play goals, Stuart Skinner stopped 19 shots and the Edmonton Oilers beat the top-seeded Dallas Stars 3-1 in the Western Conference final on Friday night to take a 3-2 series lead.
Neither team had scored a goal on the power play in the series, but Nugent-Hopkins scored on a rebound just 18 seconds after a penalty in the first period.
That was two seconds longer than it took him to score just a minute into the second period when the Oilers again had the men’s advantage with a penalty.
Game 6 will be Sunday night in Edmonton.
A home win would see the Oilers advance to the Stanley Cup Final for the first time since 2006.
By November, the team had a record of five wins, 12 losses and one draw, and had already changed coaches.
Philip Broberg scored from just inside the Oilers’ blue line.
Evan Bouchard assisted on both power-play goals, while captains Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl each had an assist on one goal.
The Stars jumped out to a 2-0 lead 5 minutes, 29 seconds into Game 4 in Edmonton and appeared poised to take the series.
Instead, they went nearly 109 minutes over six periods without scoring, their longest goalless streak of the season.
Edmonton scored eight straight goals by the end of the first period on Wednesday night to win 5-2 and then opened up a 3-0 lead on Friday.
The Stars, who fell to 4-6 at home this postseason, finally got another puck on net when Wyatt Johnston scored with 5:51 left.
Jake Oettinger made 23 saves for the Stars.
Dallas had only six shots on goal by the halfway point of the game, but Skinner had already made some quality saves at that point and would go on to make more afterwards, including on the Stars’ only power play late in the second period.
Skinner denied the 21-year-old Johnston on a one-timer just seconds after blocking Miro Heiskanen’s shot on the power play, and then early in the third, Johnston had a shot from close range blocked by Matt Duchene’s backhand.
Oettinger had no chance on Nugent-Hopkins’ first goal, which came on a rebound after Bouchard’s shot was blocked by Chris Tanev, a defenseman who was in doubt after taking a right-footed shot in the second period of the previous game.
The puck went straight to Nugent Hopkins on the other side of the goaltender.
Heiskanen received a delay of game penalty just 50 seconds into the second period after firing the puck through the glass and into the stands.
Edmonton needed just 16 seconds to score, when Draiseitel fed Nugent-Hopkins for a 30-foot snap shot.
Four minutes later, Evander Kane won a faceoff with Joe Pavelski in the right circle before Adam Henrique got the puck to Broberg, who took a long shot.
Pavelski, playing in his 200th playoff game, was involved in a shoulder collision in the first period with fellow 39-year-old skater Corey Perry, who has played in 208 playoff games and is the only active player with at least 200 games.
Perry left the game and went to the locker room but returned to the ice for the second period.
