Cutter Gauthier produced two goals and an assist as the Anaheim Ducks evened their Western Conference first-round playoff series against the Edmonton Oilers with a 6-4 win in Game 2 on Wednesday.

Game 3 is on Friday in Anaheim.

Ryan Poehling also scored twice for the Ducks, who earned their first playoff victory since beating the Nashville Predators in Game 4 of the 2017 Western Conference finals.

“I thought we just played our game right from the start,” Poehling said. “We played fast, we kind of set the aggression. I think that’s going to be important moving forward. We want to make them play defense. They don’t like doing that, and we did a great job of that tonight.”

Anaheim’s Alex Killorn had a goal and two assists, Jacob Trouba added a goal, Jackson LaCombe had three assists, and Lukas Dostal made 33 saves.

Leon Draisaitl registered a goal and an assist and Connor Ingram stopped 22 shots for the Oilers, who came from behind late in Game 1 to win 4-3 on Monday. Connor Murphy, Zach Hyman and Josh Samanski posted Edmonton’s other goals.

The Ducks scored two power-play goals and one short-handed goal.

“We lost the special teams battle,” Hyman said. “Special teams are huge in the playoffs, and we need to be better.”

Matt Savoie won the puck back for the Oilers on a backcheck in the Anaheim zone and Samanski finished off the play with a one-timer from the left circle off a feed from Jack Roslovic to tie it 4-4 at 13:51 of the third period.

Gauthier shot a loose puck into the net from the bottom of the left circle after Ingram made a save to move the Ducks back ahead 5-4 with 4:52 left.

Poehling scored into an empty net with 1:10 remaining.

Draisaitl was credited with the first goal of the game when his centering pass to Vasily Podkolzin went off the skate of Anaheim defenseman Drew Helleson and into the net, giving Edmonton the lead at 8:58 of the first period.

The Ducks scored a power-play goal in their sixth straight game to tie it 1-1 at 12:48 of the first. Gauthier hit the net with a wrist shot from above the left faceoff circle as teammate Beckett Sennecke screened Ingram.

Trouba took advantage of a screen by Gauthier to score with a shot from the right point that moved the Ducks ahead 2-1 at 2:44 of the second.

The Ducks scored again on the power play when Killorn’s centering pass went off the stick blade of Oilers defenseman Evan Bouchard, off the pads of Ingram and back to Killorn, who chipped the puck into the net to make it 3-1 at 5:35 of the middle frame.

Kasperi Kapanen stopped a clearing attempt at the Edmonton blue line, leading to a slap shot from above the circles by Murphy that beat Dostal with help from a screen to cut the gap to 3-2 at 11:46 of the second.

Connor McDavid’s turnover in his own zone while on a power play led to a short-handed goal by Poehling on a redirection that re-established the Ducks’ two-goal lead at 15:50 of the second.

“We take a lot of pride in penalty killing, especially late in this postseason,” Poehling said. “Against a great power play like that, you just want to do your best, and we’ve done such a great job so far.”

The Oilers scored again before the end of the period, with Hyman’s redirection at 17:48.

“I think people forget we just got Leo and (Hyman) back (from injuries),” McDavid said of the Edmonton power play, which went 0-for-4 in Game 2 and is 0-for-6 in the series. “We haven’t ran our normal sets in some time. We will be part of the series.”

–Field Level Media