The Edmonton Oilers were defeated 4-3 by the Buffalo Sabres when Alex Tuch scored the winning goal 33 seconds into overtime at Rogers Place on Tuesday (Dec. 9) night.
Related: Doan & Thompson Propel Sabres to 4-3 Overtime Victory Over Oilers
Edmonton captain Connor McDavid scored twice and Vasily Podkolzin added a goal for the Oilers, who rallied from a 3-0 deficit in the third period. Buffalo’s Josh Doan had two goals and Tage Thompson also tallied for the Sabres.
Oilers goalie Stuart Skinner made 24 saves on 28 shots. Buffalo netminder Colten Ellis stopped all six shots he faced before leaving the game with an injury late in the first period. Ellis was replaced by Alex Lyon, who made 21 saves in a winning effort.
Edmonton failed to convert any of its four power-play opportunities, while Buffalo went two-for-six with the man advantage.
The Oilers now have a record of 13-11-6 for 32 points through 30 games. They currently sit fourth in the Pacific Division standings and occupy the Western Conference’s first wild card playoff spot.
McDavid Comes Up Clutch
McDavid led Edmonton on a furious comeback from a three-goal deficit in the third period. The captain got his team on the board when he put the puck past Lyon just 10 seconds into the final frame, making the score 3-1. Then, after Podkolzin had tallied to cut Buffalo’s lead to one, McDavid tied things up at 3-3 when he scored with just 1.9 seconds remaining in regulation.
Connor McDavid, Edmonton Oilers (James Guillory-Imagn Images)
This marked just the fifth time in franchise history that the Oilers have scored a game-tying goal in the final two seconds of the third period. The last time it happened was against the Dallas Stars on Jan. 4, 2007, when Ales Hemsky scored one of Edmonton’s all-time most memorable goals, finishing off a desperation rush after Dallas forward Patrik Stefan whiffed on putting the puck in an empty Oilers net.
For his career, McDavid has now scored three game-tying goals in the final minute of regulation, tied with Doug Weight for second most in franchise history. Ryan Smyth is the Oilers’ all-time leader with four game-tying goals in the final minute of the third period.
Oilers Fail to Extend Win Streak
After an underwhelming start to the season, Edmonton appeared to finally be turning the corner, with a run of relatively strong performances, punctuated by blowout victories in their previous two games, 9-4 over the Seattle Kraken on Dec. 4 and 6-2 over the Winnipeg Jets on Dec. 6.
Tuesday night presented Edmonton with a golden opportunity to gain some real momentum. All the Oilers had to do for their first three-game winning streak of 2025-26 was defeat a road-weary Sabres, who are last in the Eastern Conference standings, had just played 24 hours earlier in Calgary, and came into the game with only two wins away from home this season.
But Buffalo was the better and hungrier team for the first two periods and fully deserved its three-goal lead after 40 minutes. At the 15-minute mark of the second period, Edmonton only had 11 shots on goal. Once the Oilers got going, they fired 19 shots over the final 25 minutes of regulation, but it was only thanks to a minor miracle that Edmonton was able to salvage a point.
With the loss, Edmonton remains one of only four teams in the NHL that has yet to win at least three consecutive games this season (Buffalo, the Nashville Predators and Seattle Kraken are the others). If the Oilers are going to climb the standings and contend for first place in the Pacific, they will need to start stringing together wins consistently.
Oilers Win Another Challenge
Edmonton probably wouldn’t have gotten to overtime in the first place were it not for a successful coach’s challenge that resulted in a Sabres goal coming off the board midway through the opening frame.
Thompson appeared to have opened the scoring at 10:24 of the first period, but Oilers bench boss Kris Knoblauch challenged that the goal should be disallowed because Tuch used his hand to direct the puck to Thompson. Sure enough, the NHL Situation Room concurred, and the score remained 0-0.
Buffalo ultimately wound up taking a 1-0 lead before the end of the first period, anyway, thanks to Doan’s first goal of the game, at 19:01, and Thompson made sure he got in the scoring summary when he tallied midway through the second period to put the Sabres ahead 2-0.
The Oilers are now four-for-four on coach’s challenges this season. This was the second time that Edmonton has rallied from a deficit to force overtime after successfully challenging a goal. The Oilers have become one of the most accurate teams in the league when it comes to coach’s challenges; they were five-for-seven in 2024-25.
Edmonton wraps up its five-game homestand on Thursday (Dec. 11) evening when it hosts the Detroit Red Wings at Rogers Place.
