NHL Special Report -
Edmonton Oilers win 5-2 against the Tampa
Bay Lightening at home
Another preseason ice hockey game saw the Tampa Bay Lightening take on the Edmonton Oilers. The match took place at the Rexall Place on Thursday, 23rd of September 2010. The match started at 7:10 local time and an attendance
of 16,839 was observed out of which the majority backed their home side; the Edmonton Oilers.
The Tampa Bay Lightening were playing their third pre-season game while the Edmonton Oilers were playing their second. The game, unlike some other preseason games, was a hard fought contest. Both teams pressed on which made this
encounter more of an offensive battle.
During the period, Edmonton Oilers Head Coach, Tom Renney said “The game will continue to be an offensive battle as both teams are strong on the offence. But I am waiting to see which team scores first due to the fact that both
teams are leaving open spaces when they face a fast break.”
As soon as the Head Coach said this, the Tampa Bay Lightening scored in the fifth minute thanks to a snap off zone 21 feet shot by Randy Jones. This was the only goal that the Tampa Bay Lightening managed to score after 14 attempts
on goal. Though they had many opportunities, they lacked the ability to finish off their chances.
Conversely, the home team’s hard work and extra enthusiasm thanks to the home crowd resulted in them upping their performance considerably. They managed to come up with 11 shots during the course of the first period, scoring two.
The first of their goals came from Magnus Paajarvi due to some brilliant wrist work by him from 20 feet. The next goal came just three minutes later in the 19th minute. It was scored by Andrew Cogliano from 12 feet out after good work from his colleagues.
The Tampa Bay defender Brett Clarke said “I am disappointed due to the fact that they had less goal attempts then we did but still they are leading. Let’s hope we gain momentum and manage to outplay them during the next two periods.”
However, this was not to be the case as the dominance of the Edmonton Oilers continued and out of the four shots they made they managed to score in the seventh minute thanks to a 40 feet snap off by Magnus Paajarvi. This was the
only goal of the second period. The Tampa Bay Lightening, on the other hand, came up with 8 long range shots out of which none were able to go past the Oilers’ goaltender. Hence, at the end of the second period the score was 3-1 in favour of the home team.
Alex Plante of the Edmonton Oilers said “We will be looking to continue the game we have shown so far and will try to score one or two times during the last period.”
As the last period began, Tampa Bay Lightening were looking to get back a goal or two so that they might have a chance to win the match. However, again the Oilers spoiled any party plans the Lightening had as they displayed aggressive
offence skills. They scored two goals in the 8th and the 10th minute of the period.
The first out of the two was scored by Taylor Hall thanks a spectacular backhand shot from 8 feet. The second goal was scored again by Magnus Paajarvi, who completed his hat-trick thanks to a snap shot from a distance of 43 feet.
The score after this was 5-1 in favour of the Edmonton Oilers.
However, in the 18th minute Tampa Bay finally responded, but it was more of a consolation goal by Carter Ashton. The match ended with the Edmonton Oilers winning 5-2.
The Tampa Bay Lightening Head Coach Guy Boucher said “This was without a doubt a very disappointing performance keeping in mind the fact that we took the lead. Now we have to sit and think what went wrong so that we don’t suffer
in future.”
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