A Win is a Win... I Guess

The Oilers came out determined to win this game in the first period but faded away after getting a two goal lead. The Kings went hard at the Oilers and tied the game late in the third an forced overtime. In the shootout 3 misses, a save and goal by David Perron lead the Oilers to victory.

Highlights

First Period

• 17:56 5v4 - Dwight King for Hooking - Drawn by Nikita Nikitin 15:56 5v5 - Penalty expired
• 15:23 GOAL - This play starts with Matt Hendricks holding the zone and getting the puck down low to Derek Roy. The puck comes back to Hendricks who makes a nice pass up to Oscar Klefbom. Klefbom finds Roy once again who gets the puck up to Hendricks at the top of the circle who blasts it past Jonathan Quick.
• 4:07 4v5 - Leon Draisaitl for hooking - Drawn by Trevor Lewis
• 2:37 3v5 - Jeff Petry for tripping - Drawn by Dustin Brown
• 2:07 4v5 - Penalty expired
• 0:37 5v5 - Penalty expired

The Oilers played one of their best periods of hockey. Boyd Gordon killed 10 seconds on the first faceoff of the 5v3 when he went down and kept the puck from moving. They played the 5v3 almost perfectly. As for Roy, it was nice to see the vision he has on the ice. Unfortunately he went down with an injury right after notching his assist on the first goal.

Second Period

Roy returned in the second. Not much occurred for the first 9 minutes of the second period. LA lead on the shot clock but there wasn’t much for quality chances.

• 10:40 - Hall dishes a pass to Ryan Nugent-Hopkins which leads to a 3 on 1 with Jordan Eberle and Jeff Petry. Hugent-Hopkins held onto the puck for a bit too long and nothing came of it. IT WAS A FREAKING 3 ON 1!!!
• 10:28 GOAL - After the blown 3 on 1 Klefbom makes a great effort to keep the puck in and gets onto Nugent-Hopkins’ stick. He gets the puck up to Taylor Hall who waits until Nugent-Hopkins is ready for the pass. Hall makes the pass and this time Nugent-Hopkins makes no mistake.
• 7:42 5v4 - Andy Andreoff for roughing - Drawn by Ben Scrivens
• 5:42 5v5 - Penalty expired
• 5:11 4v4 - Tyler Toffoli for roughing and Yakupov for slashing

Most of the second period happened in about a 5 minute span. There was a goal and few penalties.

Third Period

The third had more chances than the second did to start. Hall had a pretty good chance that was deflected by Doughty. LA poured it on the 3rd and just kept coming.

• 9:58 GOAL - This was a strange one because it wasn’t caught until the TV timeout. The play continued for another 34 seconds but it was determined that a shot that appeared to be off the crossbar really was a goal by Drew Doughty.
• 5:04 5v4 - Anze Kopitar tripping - Drawn by Hall
• 3:04 5v5 - Penalty expired
• 3:01 4v5 - Justin Schultz for histicking - Drawn by Toffoli
• 2:25 GOAL - Jake Muzzin, on the power play, receives a pass just below the faceoff dot and puts it past Scrivens.

OT

• 3:24 - Toffoli gets two whacks at the puck in close but can’t put it away
• 1:41 - Eberle gets in tight and gets a chance but hits the side of the net. This started a sequence that allowed the Oilers to hold the zone for almost 50 seconds.
• 0:46 - Perron gets a good shot on net but can’t get it past Quick

Shootout

• 1 - Jeff Carter - Save
• 1 - Roy - Miss
• Right before the second shooter Daryl Sutter points out that Scrivens has the wrong colour tape (orange) on his stick.
• 2 - Kopitar - Miss
• 2 - Eberele - Save (Went upstairs but it was determined to be a save)
• 3 - Tiffoli - Post
• 3 - Hendricks - Miss
• 4 - Justin Williams - Miss
• 4 - David Perron - GOAL

Thoughts

This was Todd Nelson's first solo game behind the Oilers bench. Try as he may the Kings just kept coming with shot after shot after shot and finally got the goals they were looking for. There were definitely some deficiencies but for some reason they weren't as glaring, at least in the first two periods, as they have been in the past. Maybe its because they played better or maybe its just because I've grown so accustomed to the Oilers style of hockey this season that I really didn't notice.

The third period was very telling. Every time the Oilers got out of their zone it was time for a line change. Beyond the first few chances in the third by the Oilers the period belonged to the Kings.

When the overtime period started out it looked as if the Kings were going to win it. There were some decent chances by the Kings but luckily for the Oilers they stayed out. Then for the last 2 minutes of overtime the Oilers really looked determined. There were some good chances but again nothing came of it.

As for the shootout, this was truly a coin flip. The Kings missed the net three times and the Oilers missed it twice.

A win is great no matter how you try to slice it but a win like this comes with mixed feelings. This is the Oilers 8th win of the season and it came in a shootout, in game 37 of the season. Its tough to get excited about a win especially if they miss out on McDavid because of 2 stupid points.

Finally, if you would've asked me before the game, there is no way I'd have given the win to Scrivens. He surprised me tonight once again he faced way too many shots but at least this time he gave the Oilers a chance to win.

Up Next

See you tomorrow night for the New Years Eve classic against the Flames. I have the pleasure of writing the post game thoughts again and will be at a New Years party with a bunch of Flames fans. Thanks for that one Oilers and the NHL.