Tulsa claims 4-3 win over Mississippi

SOUTHAVEN, Miss. – The Tulsa Oilers earned their first playoff win in six years just when they needed it the most.
Down 2-0 and facing elimination in a best-of-five series with the Mississippi RiverKings , the Oilers scored three unanswered goals in the final 26 minutes of play to earn a 4-3 decision at the DeSoto Civic Center in front of an announced crowd of 2,436. Defenseman Derek Eastman picked up the game winner on his first even-strength goal of the season at 13:23 of the third period, capping the come from behind victory. Eastman’s unassisted goal came after stealing the puck in the offensive zone and beating Mississippi goalie Alexander Pechurskiy. Trailing 3-1 in the second period, Luke Lucyk scored on a power play goal at the 18:14 mark to pull Tulsa within one goal. Chad Costello and Eastman picked up assists on the goal. Braden Walls continued the comeback effort at 8:06 of the third period, scoring the Oilers’ first even-strength goal of the series to tie the game. Marty Standish and Evan Kotsopoulos were awarded assists on Walls’ screen shot from the left circle. The two teams went into the first intermission tied 1-1 after each team scored a power play goal in the opening frame. In the previous two games, all four Oilers goals came on the power play. For the first time in the series, the Oilers scored first when Michel Beausoleil knocked home a rebound at 2:21 of the first period. Tom Dignard and Costello were credited with the assists on the goal that came on the man advantage while Matt Summers was in the penalty box on a hooking call. The goal was Beausoliel’s third of the series. The RiverKings evened it up at 14:40 of the first when Chris Richards scored his third goal of the series, also on the man advantage. Richards managed to slip the puck past Tulsa’s Trevor Cann off of a rebound, with assists going to Chris Auger and Brennan Sarazin.

Mississippi put some distance between themselves and Tulsa with two second period goals. Louis Dumont gave the ‘Kings a 2-1 lead at 1:01 of the second when he took a feed from Darrell Stoddard and slipped it between Cann’s pads. Fresh out of the penalty box, Patrik Levesque beat Cann on a short-handed goal at 16:54 to increase the RiverKings’ lead to two goals before the Oilers battled back to claim the win. Cann managed to hold off a flurry of pressure within the final minute after Pechurskiy was pulled in favor of an extra attacker. On the night, Cann stopped 36 of 39 shots in his first playoff win. Pechurskiy saved 26 of 30 shots as he accepted his first loss of the series. Tulsa will look to even the series in game four at the DeSoto Civic Center on Tuesday night. Opening face-off for the pivotal game is scheduled for 7:05 p.m.
 
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Contact the photographer at les.stockton@prohockeynews.com