The Edmonton Oilers welcomed the New Jersey Devils on Friday and played terrible hosts in sending the Devils off with a 4-0 loss while playing in their alternate sweaters.
Mikko Koskinen made 29 saves in the shutout win for the Oilers.
“The one really great chance they had went off the crossbar, he didn’t have to make an outstanding save. He was just in position and made the game look simple,” Oilers head coach Dave Tippett said. “That was a strong game by our goaltender. He was positionally sound and right in tune with the game and got rewarded with the shutout.”
Leon Draisaitl extended his point streak to eight games with a goal.
“It was a good 60 (minutes) for us all the way through,” Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (two assists) said. “It started with Mikko making some big saves, especially early and that kind of gives you a jump start, and it started from our D up to the forwards. It was a good response after our last game (5-2 loss to the St. Louis Blues on Wednesday), so it was definitely nice to finish up the homestand with a win.”
Alex Chiasson, Gaetan Haas and James Neal also scored for the Oilers.
“I thought it was more of a 50-50 game than the scoreboard said it was,” Devils coach John Hynes said. “When they had opportunities, they were able to put the puck in the net. We had some real quality looks and opportunities, and the puck didn’t get in the net.”
The Oilers improved to 11-5-2.
“It’s a hard league and especially on the road, you have to find your game early,” the Devils Taylor Hall said. “Any kind of let up and a couple of bad shifts and it ends up in the back of your net. I thought we had some good, sustained periods of time where we played well and probably maybe deserved a goal or two, but that can happen, especially on the road, especially against a team that are playing pretty dangerous right now, and we didn’t seem to have an answer for that in the second period.”
[WATCH: All Devils vs. Oilers highlights]
Cory Schneider made 28 saves in the loss as the Devils dropped to 4-7-4.
“I thought we played pretty well at that point,” Schneider said. “They got a good look on the Draisaitl breakaway. They bury theirs and we hit the crossbar on our breakaway (Taylor Hall), and that was the difference until then. Up to then, I thought we played pretty well structure-wise, keeping their top guys and not letting them be too threatening, and then obviously, those two goals quickly in the second made the change in the game.”
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