2010 Compuware NHL Premiere Series – Edmonton Oilers versus the Montreal Canadiens
The Montreal Canadiens will be facing the Edmonton Oilers this Wednesday for the first of two meetings. The matches of the two teams have recently been won by the team playing at home and by one goal. Last year’s two matches saw both teams win 1 game each.
The Edmonton Oilers confidence would be boosted after learning that Martin Gerber is back in the NHL and has shown some decent form for the Edmonton Oilers. Martin Gerber in one of the most important assets of the Oilers; he has played in 3 Stanley Cup Finals
for three different teams. Coupled with this is the fact that Gerber made 22 saves out of 23 shots last week as he played vital role as the Oilers won the match against the Ottawa Senators.
Last week’s encounter with the Ottawa Senators saw Martin Gerber making a brilliant save after which the Edmonton Oilers counterattacked and scored. The Oilers eventually won the match 4-1 as the brilliant goal keeper made 22 saves during the course of the
match. Shots flew from everywhere and every now and them but Gerber stopped all of them.
The goalie stopped Daniel Alfredsson, captain of the Ottawa Senators from scoring early in the 2nd period which would have doubled the lead. The Oilers attack also rose to the occasion and constructed attacks regularly which saw them scoring 4
times in the match to win it in the end.
At the end of the match the star selection of the match Martin Gerber said, "It's definitely nice to have this one," said Gerber, who backed up Ray Emery during the Senators' march to the 2007 Final and played 57 games for the team the following season.
"It's always emotional to play somewhere you've been around for a while and it was really great to see the guys out there compete and, for most of the game, we had a good game."
However, the Edmonton Oilers are the weaker of the two teams on paper. Currently, the Edmonton Oilers have played 23 games out of which they have won only 11 games and scored 18 points. While the Montreal Canadiens have played 24 games so far winning 16
games and scoring 31 points.
Though the Montreal Canadiens might be looking strong, they haven’t been able to come up with back to back wins since mid November when they had 4 consecutive wins. After that the Canadiens have played six games resulting in alternative wins and losses.
This Saturday, the Montreal Canadiens won the match against the Buffalo Sabres 3-1 and have a chance to win their 2nd consecutive game when they face the Edmonton Oilers this Wednesday. After the match the goal keeper of the Montreal Canadiens
said, "We played pretty hard tonight." Carey Price stopped 34 shots, he added, "We all wanted to bounce back from (Friday) night's game (a 3-0 loss in Atlanta) and I thought everybody came out with the right mentality and played hard the whole game."
The Edmonton Oiler has Taylor Hall in hot form who has scored in the last two victories of the Edmonton Oilers.
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