Ischemic stroke, a major cause of adult disability, results from the blockage of blood flow to the brains, leading to neurological impairments. After a stroke, the neural circuits in the peri-infarct zone undergo plastic changes to allow a spontaneous restoration of the neurological function. However, the extent of spontaneous recovery is highly variable among patients, underscoring the need for neurophysiological biomarkers to predict recovery outcomes and guide treatment strategies. Employing a well-established model of ischemic stroke in mice, the distal middle cerebral artery occlusion (dMCAO), we investigated the relationship between motor deficits and cortical changes in the peri-infarct area after stroke. Behavioral tests (rotarod, grip strength, and gridwalk) were conducted at various intervals post-stroke (D02, D09, D30) to evaluate the evolution of motor performance, classifying subjects into good or poor recoverers. To explore the potential correlations between behavioral impairments and neuronal changes, we performed both spontaneous and evoked in vivo local field potential (LFP) recordings in anesthetized Thy1-ChR2-YFP transgenic mice, at D09 and D30, the sub-acute and chronic phase of stroke, respectively. Stroke mice displayed a substantial reduction of the total frequency power in comparison to the control group, and mice with a poor recovery outcome showed decreased excitability in response to ipsilesional premotor cortex stimulation, contrasted by heightened responses to contralateral primary motor cortex stimulation. Altogether these findings shed light on potential mechanisms about the ‘good’ and ‘poor’ recovery outcomes of the motor function, thus opening new perspectives for further preclinical investigations.