On May 10, Evan Bouchard scored at 5:38 of overtime to give the Edmonton Oilers a 4-3 victory over the Vancouver Canucks in Game 2 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Playoffs second round, tying the best-of-seven series at one win apiece.
Related: 5 Takeaways From Oilers’ Game 2 Overtime Victory Over Canucks
It wasn’t the most spectacular of goals. Anything but, in fact: Bouchard pretty much threw the puck on net, and it bounced past Canucks goaltender Arturs Silovs after deflecting off the skate of Vancouver defenceman Ian Cole at the top of the crease.
Suffice to say, Bouchard’s triumphant tally is not a contender for the Oilers’ most memorable playoff overtime goal, although the bar has been set quite high. Since joining the NHL in 1979, Edmonton has scored 28 sudden death goals in the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and they’re all special in their own way. Some just stand out a bit more than the rest.
With that said, here are the five greatest overtime goals in Edmonton’s NHL postseason history:
5) Connor McDavid
Oilers at Flames, Western Conference Second Round, Game 5 (5/26/22)
One of the sport’s greatest rivalries was renewed in the second round of the 2022 Stanley Cup Playoffs, when the Oilers and Calgary Flames met in the postseason for the first time in 31 years.
The Battle of Alberta took no time to heat up, with Calgary winning a wild first game 9-6. But from that point, the Oilers took the series over. Edmonton won Games 2, 3, and 4, setting up an opportunity to end the series with a victory in Game 5 at the Scotiabank Saddledome.
The game went back and forth. Calgary jumped out to a 2-0 lead, then Edmonton led 3-2, then Calgary led 4-3. When regulation ended, the teams were deadlocked at four goals apiece.
Just five minutes into sudden death, Flames defenceman Noah Hanifin chipped the puck from behind his net up the half wall, but Edmonton’s Leon Draisaitl got to the puck first and fed it to Connor McDavid whose wrister from the slot beat Calgary goalie Jacob Markstrom glove side.
The Oilers captain’s goal set off a wild celebration on the visitors’ bench and sent Edmonton to the conference finals for the first time in 16 years.
4) Fernando Pisani
Oilers at Hurricanes, Stanley Cup Final, Game 5 (6/14/06)
RBC Center was ready to explode. Game 5 of the 2006 Stanley Cup Final between the Carolina Hurricanes and Oilers was early in overtime, with the home team leading the series 3-1 and about to go on a power play with an opportunity to win the championship. Then Fernando Pisani spoiled the party.
With his team short-handed, the Oilers forward pounced on an errant pass just inside the Carolina blue line, broke in alone on Hurricanes goaltender Cam Ward, and fired the puck into the top corner of the net.
The goal was the greatest moment in a postseason full of great moments for Pisani, who had an out-of-body experience during Edmonton’s magical playoff run in 2006, scoring 14 times.
Unfortunately for Oilers fans, Raleigh would eventually get to have its party. After the Oilers won Game 6 at Rexall Place to square the series 3-3, Carolina prevailed in the winner-take-all Game 7 in Raleigh.
3) Esa Tikkanen
Oilers at Flames, Smythe Division Semi-Final, Game 7 (4/21/91)
Trailing the host Flames 3-0 just 16 minutes into Game 7 of the 1991 Smythe Division Semi-Final, the defending Stanley Cup champion Oilers were in desperate need of a hero to save their season. Captain Mark Messier was skating on one leg. Joe Murphy had been sidelined by the flu. Petr Klima hadn’t scored since Game 1. Jari Kurri was somewhere in Italy. So up stepped Esa Tikkanen.
Tikkanen scored at 17:03 of the first period, set up Glenn Anderson’s goal at 4:57 of the second period, then scored again at 10:06 of the second. Suddenly the Oilers had pulled even at 3-3, thanks largely to Tikkanen. And the Finnish winger was just setting the stage for his heroics to come.
Regulation concluded with the teams tied 4-4. The first several minutes of overtime saw close calls at both ends of the rink, before Tikkanen decided to end it with an incredible individual effort.
Gathering the puck at the Calgary blue line, Tikkanen circled back at centre ice before accelerating toward the Flames’ net. As he hit the zone, he juked to his right, then wired a 40-foot shot past Calgary defenders and netminder Mike Vernon. His hat trick goal gave Edmonton its first-ever Game 7 overtime win and sent the Oilers to the next round.
2) Petr Klima
Oilers at Bruins, Stanley Cup Final, Game 1 (5/15/90)
After 60 minutes, Game 1 of the 1990 Stanley Cup Final between the Oilers and Boston Bruins was deadlocked 3-3. Another 20 minutes solved nothing. Not even a second period of sudden death could decide things. It would require a third overtime, which on top of everything else was halted for almost half an hour delay because a bank of lights went out at the old Boston Garden.
Klima had played the role of spectator for pretty much all of sudden death, benched by Edmonton coach John Muckler who didn’t seem pleased with the Czech winger’s efforts.
Finally, with a few minutes remaining in triple OT, Muckler called Klima’s number, sending the freshest player in the arena out for a shift that would last only 15 seconds. Trailing on an Oilers rush, Klima took a drop pass from Kurri and wired the puck past one-time Oilers netminder Andy Moog to give Edmonton a 1-0 series lead.
Klima’s goal at 15:13 of triple-overtime ended what was at the time the longest game in both Stanley Cup Final and Oilers postseason history. It’s still the latest into overtime that a goal has been scored by an Edmonton player.
1) Todd Marchant
Oilers at Stars, Western Conference Quarter-Final Game 7 (4/29/97)
The years between the end of Edmonton’s Stanley Cup dynasty in the early 90s and 2005-06 when the NHL implemented a salary cap and Edmonton finally made it back to the championship series were incredibly challenging for small-market Canadian teams. It was a time when every single playoff victory meant so much more. And this is the goal that defined that era of Oilers hockey.
In 1997, the Oilers returned to the postseason after missing the previous four years while enduring a rebuild. Edmonton was a huge underdog in its first round series against the powerhouse Dallas Stars, who finished the regular season with 23 more points than the Oilers.
The scrappy Oilers gave Dallas everything it could handle, pushing the Stars to the brink, with Game 7 at Reunion Arena going to sudden death tied 3-3.
In a sequence that every Oilers fan of a certain age recalls vividly, Edmonton goalie Curtis Joseph made a stunning save on Joe Nieuwendyk, and moments later Oilers centre Doug Weight fed the puck to a streaking Todd Marchant, who blew past blueliner Grant Ledyard, broke in alone and put the puck past Stars goalie Moog, who was once again victimized in sudden death by his former team. The time: 12:26 of OT.
Everything about Marchant’s goal, both in the unmatched drama of the moment and the sheer spectacularity of the play itself, is iconic. It even features an unforgettable soundtrack, the call from legendary broadcaster Bob Cole.
Will the Oilers score another overtime goal in the 2024 NHL Playoffs? And will it be special enough to crack this list? The answer could come as soon as tonight (May 18) when Edmonton faces Vancouver in Game 6 at Rogers Place, trailing the series 3-2.
