Draisaitl reaches 900-point plateau with three-assist effort in Oilers’ 3-2 OT win

By Shane Jones, The Canadian Press on December 19, 2024.

Edmonton Oilers' Zach Hyman (18) celebrates his goal against the Boston Bruins with Leon Draisaitl (29) at the bench during second-period NHL action in Edmonton on Thursday, December 19, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Timothy Matwey

EDMONTON – When Leon Draisaitl saw teammate Connor McDavid get a silver stick for hitting 1,000 points earlier this season, he clearly wanted one of his own.

Draisaitl has been pounding the points of late, recording assists on all three goals Thursday to reach the 900-point plateau as the Edmonton Oilers came back for a 3-2 overtime victory over the Boston Bruins.

At 1:04 of overtime, Bruins goalie Jeremy Swayman made the initial save on Draisaitl, but Ryan Nugent-Hopkins was there to corral the rebound and drop it to Mattias Ekholm, who scored his fourth goal of the season to secure the victory.

Draisaitl has now recorded multi-point performances in seven consecutive games. He has 18 points over the stretch.

The 29-year-old German star said reaching the 900-point mark for his career is a significant achievement.

“It feels good,” he said. “It’s a hard league and you learn a lot along the way. Every day you truly learn something new. I’m obviously proud of myself, but you can’t get to those milestones without teammates and guys trusting you, coaches trusting you.

“A big, big thank you goes out to everyone who helped along the way.”

Draisaitl hit the milestone in 751 games, the fifth-fastest of any player born outside of North America.

“Pretty incredible to be his age and have 900 points,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “It’s an extremely hard thing to accomplish. You see the work he puts in every day to be able to do that.”

Draisaitl leads the NHL with 23 goals and is second in the league with 50 points.

“He’s a sniper but he’s also a stud for us defensively and he takes a lot of faceoffs,” Ekholm said. “That’s what impresses me most about his game. There is no situation where he isn’t first over the boards.”

Zach Hyman had a goal and an assist to give him eight goals in the seven games he has played since returning from injury. McDavid also scored for the Oilers (19-11-2) who have won nine of their last 11 contests.

“It was a tough stretch with really good teams coming in here,” Draisaitl said. “All in the top 10 or top 12. It tells me that we can beat any team on any given night. It should give us a lot of confidence going forward.”

Stuart Skinner made 24 saves for the Oilers.

Elias Lindholm and Mark Kastelic replied for the Bruins (17-13-4), who had a modest two-game winning streak halted.

“We didn’t stay on the attack and got back on our heels a little bit,” Kastelic said. “It’s definitely something we can learn from.”

Swayman made 23 saves for the Bruins.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 19, 2024.