GLENDALE — As far as statements go, sweeping the Vegas and Arizona in back-to-back road games is a big one.
And the Edmonton Oilers made it in dramatic fashion Sunday, securing their hold on first place in the Pacific Division with a 4-3 shootout triumph over the Coyotes at Gila River Arena. Connor McDavid scored the only goal in the shootout.
“It shows that our group is growing,” said forward Alex Chiasson. “We’re gaining confidence and getting great goaltending. We had a short amount of time in the second where they had momentum, but as the game went on we built back our game, stuck with it and found a way to win.
“That’s what good teams do.”
The win comes on the heels of a convincing 4-2 victory over the Golden Knights Saturday and lifts Edmonton to 3-1 on a tough five-game road trip they called the defining point in their season. They’re 16-7-3 now and looking very much like a team that deserves that record.
“We didn’t have much gas in the tank, you could tell,” grinned head coach Dave Tippett. “You can tell when players are coming to the bench and they’re looking at you like ‘I’m trying, I really am,’ but there’s not much there.
“It was a tough turnaround. We played a hard, hard physical game Saturday night, so I’m proud of our guys to hang around and find a way to get two points. It was a good two days for us.”
With the first place Oilers and second place Coyotes just three points apart in the Pacific Division standings when the night began, both teams were hyping Sunday night like it was a playoff game.
It wasn’t. You can’t have a playoff atmosphere in a building with thousands of empty seats, and they don’t have three-on-three overtime or a shootout, but the Oilers and Coyotes did their best to replicate a high-stakes post-season battle anyway.
They traded leads and momentum, they fought back when it looked like they were down and out and took the game all the way to the last shot.
“This is a really big road trip for us and this was a really big win,” said goalie Mikko Koskinen, who made some monster saves in improving his record to 9-1-2. “Sometimes you just have to make those saves if you want to keep your team in the game. Today I got those and I was happy with that.”
The Oilers scored early in both the first and second periods (James Neal at 2:05 of the first and Chiasson at 1:22 of the second) to take 1-0 and 2-1 leads, but they couldn’t shake the plucky Coyotes, who fought back both times.
In the third, trailing 3-2 with under seven minutes to go, it was Edmonton’s turn to land a counter-punch. It came from the suddenly red hot Markus Granlund of all people, who scored his third goal in four games to make it 3-3.
“I think the guys did a really good job of playing solid and not giving up too much (Saturday), and that allowed us to have some legs tonight,” said Sam Gagner, who moved into the second line centre role in the absence of injured Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and responded with an assist and a plus two evening. “We got down, but we kept fighting and found a way to get two points.”
HARD DAY’S NIGHT
Leon Draisaitl logged a season high 29 minutes, over four minutes of it in overtime as he and McDavid emptied the tank during the three-on-three.
Tippett even called time out midway through the extra period to give them a breather. With Nugent-Hopkins injured, he didn’t have much of a second wave, so he rode the horses hard.
“I thought they were going to play the whole five minutes in overtime,” laughed Chiasson.
STRANGE PLAYS INDEED
A rather unfortunate turn of events midway through the second period helped turn the tide Arizona’s way. Coyotes winger Christian Fischer took a hit from McDavid along the boards in the neutral zone, then held McDavid’s leg, freezing him out of the play for several seconds. Then he sprung to his feet, beat McDavid to the slot and buried the goal that tied it 2-2,
“I saw a couple of guys swing away from the front of the net,” said Tippett. “It wasn’t McDavid. He was behind the play. We should have covered that off. There were a couple of guys watching other things than what they should have been watching.”
NO NUGE IS BAD NEWS
Tippett said his pre-game availability that a couple of players were wrestling with bumps and bruises and their status was up in the air, but no one had any idea Nugent-Hopkins was one of the players in the maybe column. But he sat Sunday out, possibly with a wrist or hand issue. They hope to have him back for Wednesday in Denver.
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rtychkowski@postmedia.com
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November 25, 2019 at 11:43AM
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