Stanley Cup Playoffs Day 8: Landeskog scores first goal since 2022, Senators, Golden Knights win in OT

Scott Maxwell
Scott Maxwell(scotmaxw)
Apr 27, 2025, 01:08 EDT
Colorado Avalanche left wing Gabriel Landeskog (92) celebrates his goal in the second period against the Dallas Stars at Ball Arena.
Credit: © Ron Chenoy

The Stanley Cup Playoffs are back, which means that for the next two months, we’ll get non-stop exciting action in the NHL as we witness history in another team looking to win a championship. Here at Daily Faceoff, we’ll be keeping you in the loop of everything that happened in the playoffs, every day until the Stanley Cup is hoisted in June.

Guentzel, Kucherov three-point nights give Bolts Game 3 win

The Tampa Bay Lightning appeared to be in trouble after dropping their first two games at home to the Florida Panthers, and to start out Game 3, it looked like much of the same when Matthew Tkachuk scored just three minutes into the game. For the third time, the Lightning were down early in the game, and you couldn’t help but get the feeling that this was looking more and more like the 2024 iteration of this series.

But this year’s Tampa Bay squad has looked more like their Cup-contending teams all season, so it was about time that we finally saw that version show up. Braydon Point tied the game later in the first, Nick Paul gave the Lightning the lead later in the second, and then Jake Guentzel, Luke Glendening and Anthony Cirelli finished it off in the third period. Both Guentzel (1 goal, 2 assists) and Nikita Kucherov (3 assists) finished the game with three points as Tampa Bay cut Florida’s series lead to 2-1.

Vegas evens series with Barbashev OT winner

While anything is possible until a team’s season is officially over, the Vegas Golden Knights were in desperate need of win. Facing a 2-1 series deficit to the Minnesota Wild, another loss would have dug them a deep hole. After doing just that to start the last two games, the Golden Knights managed to get off to a good start with an early goal from Shea Theodore, and after Marco Rossi tied the game, it was back-and-forth from that point forward. Minnesota took a 2-1 lead, Vegas took a 3-2 lead, and with Jared Spurgeon tying it again at 3-3, we needed overtime.

Neither team made it easy on each other either. More than 17 minutes and 21 shots were needed before we got our final score, as Ivan Barbashev buried a garbage goal for the game-winner. The Golden Knights took the game by a score of 4-3 to tie the series at 2-2, largely in part due to their ability to shutdown the red-hot Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy, who had just one assist between the two of them.

Sanderson’s marker in OT keeps Sens season alive

The Ottawa Senators find themselves in a situation that only four teams have ever come back from – a 3-0 series deficit. Despite some strong play from them, the Toronto Maple Leafs have had their number in this series, but now the Senators are the team playing desperate. They shifted the tide a little bit in the game, taking a 2-0 lead in the first and, after blowing that lead, getting the lead again in the third. But, Oliver Ekman-Larsson tied it with less than six minutes left, and we needed overtime for the third straight game in this series.

Early on, it looked like the Leafs might be the beneficiary for the third straight overtime as well, especially when a Drake Batherson high-stick gave them a four-minute power play. But after a successful kill put the Sens back in it, they grinded out the Leafs and a Jake Sanderson point shot found its way through traffic to give Ottawa the win and keep their season alive by cutting the series deficit to 3-1.

Landeskog scores first goal in three years as Avs blowout Stars

Gabriel Landeskog has been one of the feel-good stories late in the season, seeing him finally manage to make his comeback to the game after missing almost three years due to a cartilage replacement surgery. Just seeing him back in the lineup, especially in the playoffs, tugs on the heartstrings, but in Game 4, he finally got to contribute. With the Colorado Avalanche already up 2-0, he fired the puck past Jake Oettinger to make it 3-0 and score his first goal since a two-goal performance in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final on June 20th, 2022.

Despite the fact that Jake Oettinger had made 31 saves through two periods after the Avalanche outshot the Dallas Stars 22-5 in the second, Peter DeBoer decided to send a message to the team by pulling Oettinger before the third period. That didn’t change much, as Samuel Girard was the lone goal scorer of the period, and Colorado took the game by a score of 4-0. Landeskog had an assist to go along with his goal, and both teams now head back to Dallas with a best-of-three series on their hands.

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