Center also plus-6 against Red Wings, has 67 points in 36 games with Knoblauch as coach

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 Connor McDavid took his game to new heights Tuesday, as difficult as that may seem, when he had an NHL career-high six assists in the Edmonton Oilers’ 8-4 win against the Detroit Red Wings at Rogers Place.

The six assists gave the Oilers center 77 points (21 goals, 56 assists) in 47 games and moved him into a tie with Boston Bruins forward David Pastrnak (33 goals, 44 assists in 53 games) for third place in the NHL scoring race.

He became the third player in the past 25 years to have six assists in a single game, joining Pittsburgh Penguins defenseman Kris Letang (Dec. 27, 2023) and Oilers forward Leon Draisaitl (Jan. 31, 2021).

“I think his stat sheet says it all — six assists, plus-6, no power-play time,” Oilers coach Kris Knoblauch said. “He was skating, he was one of the few guys that was skating for a full 60 minutes. The plays that he made tonight were pretty phenomenal and if he’s not on top of his game tonight, we’re probably not winning that one.”

McDavid is 10 points behind Colorado Avalanche center Nathan MacKinnon, who has 87 points (32 goals, 55 assists) in 54 games, and 13 points back of Tampa Bay Lightning forward Nikita Kucherov, who leads the League with 90 points (34 goals, 56 assists) in 53 games.

Through nine seasons, McDavid had four assists in a game seven times and six points once; he had three goals and three assists in a 6-2 win against the Avalanche on Nov. 14, 2019. His plus-6 was also an NHL career best.

“It’s unbelievable, you can only dream of a game like that,” Edmonton forward Dylan Holloway said. “It’s pretty incredible. It’s fun to watch. He deserves it too. He brings it every day in practice, brings it every game. He had a great game tonight.”

McDavid picked up his first assist Tuesday on a goal by defenseman Cody Ceci at 11:05 of the first period to give the Oilers a 2-0 lead. He had another in the second period on Evan Bouchard’s goal at 10:17 to put Edmonton up 3-1.

With the game tied 3-3 in the third period, McDavid picked up an assist on Holloway’s goal, 44 seconds in to make it 4-3, set up Ryan Nugent-Hopkins at 3:27 to make it 5-3, fed Evander Kane in front at 13:41 for a 7-3 lead and set up Nugent-Hopkins again at 17:49 for the 8-4 final.

McDavid’s third assist of the game gave him 600 for his NHL career in 616 games, becoming the fourth-fastest player to reach the milestone behind Wayne Gretzky (416), Mario Lemieux (514) and Bobby Orr (608).

“He’s kind of like every night, he’s really dominant,” Red Wings defenseman Moritz Seider said. “I think today he got the better of us, which is really frustrating, because up to that point I thought we did a pretty solid job of containing him.”

McDavid also extended his home scoring streak to 19 games (46 points; 12 goals, 34 assists).

Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde said it was a case of McDavid elevating his game in the third and Detroit not making it difficult enough for him.

“We will take what we did against him for two periods and then he gets feeling it a little bit, and our compete drops off just enough,” Lalonde said. “You can see a little more sag in some gaps, some turnovers, we’re not at the top of our game and it was a little too easy for him. We made it easy on him.”

McDavid has been the driving force behind the Oilers’ resurgence after Edmonton got off to a 2-9-1 start this season and fell to the bottom of the NHL standings. The Oilers are 28-8-0 since Knoblauch took over as coach for Jay Woodcroft on Nov. 12. McDavid has 67 points (19 goals, 48 assists) in 36 games under Knoblauch.

“He’s pretty dialed in as per usual. From the moment the pucks drops to the moment the final buzzer rings, he’s pretty dialed in,” Holloway said. “It comes from his preparation, he’s like that every day at practice, every workout he’s dialed in. It was only a matter of time before he popped off like that.”

Only Gretzky and Billy Taylor Sr. have more than six assists in a game. Gretzky did it three times with Edmonton, on Feb. 15, 1980, against the Washington Capitals; Dec. 11, 1985, against the Chicago Blackhawks and Feb. 14, 1986, against the Quebec Nordiques. Taylor Sr. did it with Detroit on March 16, 1947, against Chicago.

It was the latest historic night for McDavid, who has won the Hart Trophy three times (2017, 2021, 2023), the Ted Lindsay Award four times (2017, 2018, 2021, 2023) and the Art Ross Trophy five times (2017, 2018, 2021, 2022, 2023).

“I thought we had a couple lucky ones,” McDavid said. “I think the first one was a little lucky. ‘Nuge’ makes a great play on one, Nuge makes a good play on a couple. I play with some good players, obviously, and tonight was a good night.”