Minnesota Wild rebound to take match in shootout over Edmonton Oilers 3-2 -NHL Update
The 16,000 plus crowd at the sold out Rexall Place in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, was in for a big surprise on Wednesday night, November 30, 2011, as the Edmonton Oilers maintained their 2-0 lead for the first 30 minutes but the Wild came right back and forced
an overtime extension which lead into a shootout decider as Minnesota made the winning shot to take the match, 3-2.
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins scored his 11th goal of the 2011-2012 National Hockey League (NHL) regular season nearly midway through the opening period while Jordan Eberle scored another to extend the lead during their first power play opportunity of the
second period with Minnesota missing Greg Zanon.
Devin Setoguchi finally got Minnesota back on the scoreboard nearly six minutes later with Kyle Brodziak scoring on a power play advantage of their own in the next three minutes to level the match.
"What we've got to pay attention to is this is our rink, this is our home," Oilers coach Tom Renney said. "We have to make it tougher to play us here."
Edmonton had 12 opportunities in the third and final period of regulation while Minnesota had nine, but both failed on all as the match entered into a five-minute overtime extension.
"We don't look for excuses -- not that we don't look for them, we don't accept them," first-year coach Mike Yeo said. "We have a bunch of fighters. Things were not going our way, I didn't like our start to the game. But we kept fighting and finding a way
-- we were clawing our way into that game."
Eberle capitalised on Edmonton’s first shootout chance, which was levelled by Pierre-Marc Bouchard.
After missing their second opportunity, Mikko Koivu took the lead for Minnesota in the shootout but Edmonton’s Sam Gagner added another to tie it once again. Shawn Horcoff fired off another on the Oilers fifth chance but Dany Heatley managed to level it
again, but as Ryan Smyth missed Edmonton’s next, Kyle Brodziak made the game-winner on their next shot.
Minnesota now stands at the number one spot in the Western Conference while Edmonton moved down to the 10th position.
Edmonton has the next at home against the Columbus Blue Jackets on Friday while Minnesota will be hosting the New Jersey Devils on the same day.
Tags: