Utah Mammoth center Clayton Keller (9) shoots the winning goal 33 second into the overtime stanza to help defeat the visiting Edmonton Oilers at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City on Tue Apr 7, 2026 (AP News photo)
Utah Mammoth Game Wrap: The Mammoth have scored 25 goals over the past four games in their playoff push.
By Tom Walker
SALT LAKE CITY–The Utah Mammoth (40-30-6) returned to Delta Center Tuesday night following a successful three-game sweep of games against Pacific Division teams in Los Angeles, Seattle, and Vancouver, scoring a minimum of six goals in each of the victories. The Mammoth came away with a 6-5 win over the Pacific Division’s best the Edmonton Oilers Tuesday night.
In their win against the Canucks, Utah became the third team in NHL history to win 40 games in their second NHL season, joining the Vegas Golden Knights and Seattle Kraken.The offensive surge couldn’t have come at a more opportune moment heading into the home stretch of the regular season.
Though the Mammoth have been holding down the top Wild Card slot in the Western Conference for some time, a number of conference rivals remain in the hunt for the postseason, and Utah is not yet mathematically guaranteed to punch their card to make a Mammoth playoff debut. Utah went 1-3-0 on the previous homestand, and will now play five of their remaining six regular season games at home.
Squaring off against the Mammoth on Tuesday night were the Edmonton Oilers (39-29-9) who currently share the Pacific Division lead with the Anaheim Ducks, and who entered the contest a perfect 5-0-0 against Utah since the former Arizona Coyotes were rechristened as a new franchise in Salt Lake City.
Mammoth forward JJ Peterka got things going for Utah less than two minutes into the contest with his 24th goal of the season, a slap shot, assisted by Ian Cole and Michael Carcone. Before the goal announcement could even be completed, the Oilers tied things up 11 seconds later on a backhand by Edmonton forward Curtis Lazar, his fourth of the year, assisted by Adam Henrique and Matthias Ekholm.
It would only get worse for the Mammoth from there. With Clayton Keller in the penalty box for high-sticking against Curtis Lazar, Connor McDavid showed why he remains one of the game’s elite forwards, blowing effortlessly through the Utah defense and putting the puck past Karel Vejmelka for his 44th goal of the season, assisted by Evan Bouchard and netminder Tristan Jarry.
At 14:43 the Oilers made it 3-1 on the 19th of the year by Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, assisted by Kasperi Kapanen, which is where things concluded as the two squads headed to their respective locker rooms. Jarry turned away 10 of 11 Utah shots while Vejmelka surrendered three goals on seven shots by the Oilers.
Utah settled down a bit in the second period, keeping Edmonton at bay for the first half of the frame, and then at 10:28 forward Nick Schmaltz got the Mammoth to within one with his 29th goal of the season, assisted by Clayton Keller and Lawson Crouse.
With a little more than four minutes remaining, Logan Cooley brought Utah back the rest of the way, scoring his 23rd goal of the season on a slap shot, assisted by Dylan Guenther and Sean Durzi. Unfortunately for Utah, for the second time in the game, the goal announcement could not be completed before the Oilers immediately went ahead 4-3 on Vasily Podkolzin’s 18th goal of the season, assisted by Darnell Nurse and McDavid.
Making matters worse, with less than two minutes left in the period, MacKenzie Weegar went to the sin bin for hooking against McDavid. But rather than surrendering another goal on the power play, Schmaltz came through shorthanded for his second goal of the night and 30th on the season to even the score at 4-4, with John Marino and Alexander Kerfoot picking up the assists. 30 goals and 40 assists for 70 points are a new career high for Schmaltz, who signed an 8-year $64 million contract extension in March. The Mammoth flipped the script from the opening frame, this time outscoring Edmonton 3-1, with Vejmelka stopping 11 of 12 Oilers shots and Jarry turning away 7 of 10 by Utah.
Edmonton regained the lead 5-4 at 2:09 of the third period when Colton Dach registered his fifth goal of the season, assisted by Trent Frederic and Jason Dickinson, but Utah wasn’t done yet. At 12:56, the Mammoth came back to tie the score for the third time in the game when Alexander Kerfoot, who was camped out in front of the Oilers net, tipped in a shot from Sean Durzi for his sixth goal of the season, with the additional helper to Michael Carcone, to make the score 5-5 and send the game to overtime.
Just 25 seconds into bonus hockey, Matt Savoie was whistled for tripping against Logan Cooley to give Utah a 4-on-3 power play. The Mammoth wasted no time taking advantage of the opportunity, with captain Clayton Keller netting the game winner eight seconds later to give Utah its first franchise victory over Edmonton, a possible first round playoff opponent. Keller’s 26th goal of the season was assisted by Mikhail Sergachev and Dylan Guenther.
In the locker room, Schmaltz commented on the intensity level of the game, “It was pretty high. We kind of know where we stand and where they stand. These points are so valuable. We want to get that X by our name, as fast as we can. So we’re doing everything we can, and we’re battling every night, and two points is huge, especially against that team.”
Keller added, “I think we stuck with it all game, obviously being down 3-1, and I still feel like we were playing good hockey. A couple of bounces here and there, but just part of the way that we stuck with it. We had a big push in the third. We were playing our style of hockey. We get the goal there, and then we keep pressing. We don’t sit back and back up. It’s a good step in the right direction, and still got some games left, so it’s a huge win.” Of his linemate’s 30 goals, Keller said, “You guys know, I think the world of him. Him as a player and person and just so gifted, fast, skilled, thinks the game at such a high level, and has such a good stick. There’s so many things about his game that people don’t recognize or truly appreciate as much as all of us do in this room, and just how good he is. That’s huge for him, for sure. He’s got that sneaky little wrister, and he’s good in tight. He’s got good hands. That’s great to see him get that, and I don’t think that’s the ceiling for him honestly.” On coming back from behind three separate times, the captain said, “I think just pressing when we were down. It still felt like we had lots of confidence all game. We never had that span of being down on ourselves, or whatever it may be. We just kept rolling it over and trusting that it would turn and I think that’s something that we’ve gotten better at as the year has gone on, so good on us.”
Head Coach André Tourigny was all smiles beginning his post-game session with the media, repeating a refrain from earlier in the season, “are we entertained?” Talking about the lines of Schmaltz and Cooley containing McDavid, Bear commented, “those two lines shared McDavid all night long. I think they did a really good job … they played really well against 97, so I think they played a complete game.” Explaining why he started the overtime period with Cooley on the ice, Tourigny added, “I didn’t want somebody who couldn’t skate with McDavid. And he had the fire in his eyes; I got this, I got this. I said, ‘Hey, don’t take chase, don’t worry.’ He didn’t really even want to hear me. He was kind of just, just put me out there and don’t worry. He drew the penalty, and we scored on that. So, proud of the young guy.” On the team’s resiliency, Bear added, “People talk about going over the hump, and this and that; those guys want to win. They want to perform, and sometimes that gets in our way, because wanting to get a result sometimes makes you focus on the wrong thing. You need to focus on the process, but those guys have always been driven to achieve great things. They want to be a championship team. They know there’s growth to get there, but I never doubt their resiliency as a team, and they believe in each other. I like the fact that they believe in each other. They know we’re a good team and we can achieve good things together, so there’s a strong belief.”
Next up for Utah (41-30-6) on Thursday are the Nashville Predators (37-31-10), who shut out the Anaheim Ducks 5-0 on the road Tuesday night to leapfrog the Los Angeles Kings into the second Wild Card spot in the Western Conference.
