The Edmonton Oilers punched their ticket to the Western Conference Final with an epic 1-0 overtime win over the Vegas Golden Knights in Game 5 on Wednesday night.
The Oilers will get an extra couple of days to rest and recover as they wait for the winner of the Dallas Stars-Winnipeg Jets series to end. With the Stars leading the Jets 3-1, and with a chance to close out the series on Thursday night, the likelihood of an Oilers-Stars Conference Final is highly plausible.
So, let’s take a look at three key reasons why the Edmonton Oilers hope to avoid the Dallas Stars in the Western Conference Final this postseason.
3 reasons why Edmonton Oilers hope to avoid Dallas Stars in Western Conference Final in 2025 Stanley Cup playoffs
#3 Stars’ relentless grinding style
The Dallas Stars are a team built specifically for the playoffs. They play a tough, grinding style based on relentless forechecking and solid defensive play.
That grinding style tends to wear high-octane teams like the Colorado Avalanche and Winnipeg Jets. While the Avalanche pushed the Stars to seven games, the Jets haven’t been able to have much success against the Stars.
As such, the Edmonton Oilers will be hard-pressed to find space for Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl to break away from the Stars’ tight checking. If they can’t, then it will be up to the Oilers’ depth scoring to pick up the slack against a formidable Stars’ bottom six.
#2 The Stars are at full strength
In the Colorado first-round series, the Stars were down Jason Robertson and Miro Heiskanen. Now, the Stars are back to full strength and have dominated the Presidents’ Trophy-winning Jets.
That situation doesn’t bode well for the Edmonton Oilers who will be facing the full force of a Dallas team that lacks any glaring weaknesses. As a result, the Oilers will have to contend with a solid bottom six, not to mention an overwhelming top six that features this postseason’s breakout star in Mikko Rantanen.
#1 Facing Mikko Rantanen
Speaking of Mikko Rantanen, the star winger got off to a slow start during the first round, but exploded toward the end of the Colorado series and maintained that momentum against the Jets.
Rantanen has scored back-to-back hat tricks this postseason and has racked up 19 points in 11 games to lead the 2025 Stanley Cup playoff scoring race.
The Oilers will be in tough trying to keep Rantanen off the scoresheet. Doing so may require significant attention on the Stars’ top line, opening up the team to the other lines and capitalizing on more scoring opportunities.
If the Oilers can neutralize Rantanen, they’ll force the Stars’ other lines to beat them. So, the Oilers’ success in a series against the Stars could boil down to keeping Rantanen under wraps.
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Edited by Nestor Quixtan
