The opposing view: Mile High Hockey

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Two Consecutive Victories Is A Streak

A three goal second period helped propel the Oilers to a 4-2 victory over Anaheim on Sunday. David Perron scored a shorthanded goal for the Oilers, his 27th goal of the season. Perron scoring a shorthanded goal is especially noteworthy because it was the Oilers SCORING a shorthanded goal instead of yielding one. Taylor Hall is now at a point per game with just three games remaining, Viktor Fasth picked up a victory, and the Oilers are picking up points in the race for 28th (29th?) overall. It's on, Panthers.

The Oilers are saying

That's Avalanche coach Patrick Roy on what he'd like to see from his team. The Avalanche are wrapping up the season on a four game road trip beginning tonight in Edmonton.

Has someone bought Semyon Varlamov a bouquet yet? Guy's earned one with his play between the pipes.

The Avalanche have had a pretty fine season on paper. They've got 50 wins, they're going to the playoffs, and things look pretty good from this side of the grass. Under that nice 50 win blanket, it's hard not to notice that the Avalanche are 21st in total shots, and there are only four other teams in the league who allow more shots per game than Colorado does. Avalanche are +30 on the entire season in goals scored, so what's going on over there?

It's not all Semyon Varlamov, but when your goaltender is holding it down with a .927 SV% after 62 games of play, he's doing something pretty fine. It's worth two glances once you realize that Varlamov has faced the most shots out of any of the goaltenders in the NHL this year. The Avalanche are in good hands if that .927 stays where it is.

Again, it's not all Varlamov, but he's helping Patrick Roy look like a genius so far.

• With Viktor Fasth collecting the victory in against the Ducks, I'd say it's a fair bet that Ben Scrivens will get the start for the Oilers tonight. It's looking like the Avalanche plan to go with J-S Giguere (10-6-0, .910SV%) in order to get Semyon Varlamov a night off. Now seems like a pretty good time to point out that Giguere is one of the last players in the NHL who played on the final Hartford Whalers team.
• SLIGHTLY RELATED The world's known about Mark Arcobello's deal for some time now, but I still can't wrap my head around the fact that he's making just 600K on his new one-way deal. I'm struggling to think of a better contract on this team in 2014-15.
• THE RACE TO 29th- Remaining for Edmonton (3) - COL, LA, VAN. Remaining for Florida - (3) PHI, TOR, CLB. Edmonton has 65 points, Florida has 64. Finally, a race for us to watch.
• THE ANTON LANDER EXPERIENCE...is going less smooth than one would hope. Brings back recent memories of the Taylor-Hall-At-C experience. Certainly not suggesting that Anton Lander and Taylor Hall are near the same player, but I will suggest that sometimes guys who are likely 4Cs who are playing out of position in a top six role sometimes don't pan out the way you'd like.