BOX SCORE
EDMONTON -- An odd carom off the back boards, a bad goal off a turnover, and a horrendous second period.
Thats all it took Thursday night for the Oilers to make the Flyers 1-1 on this four-game road trip with a 2-0 shutout victory at Rexall Place.
All the momentum and "feel-good" atmosphere from the Flyers overtime win Tuesday in Winnipeg wasted.
Peter Laviolettes club has not won consecutive games since Jan. 10-12more than a month ago.
Afterward, Laviolette was steaming in anger. His players talked about lack of traffic and poor effort in the second stanza as being the difference.
The assessment of the second period is accurate, its disgraceful, Laviolette said. Youd like to think this serves as a wake-up call because were in a playoff race. Tonight is unacceptable.
NHL
We eased our way into the first period, the second period was (expletive). Wake up and try to win a game in the third period. Hopefully, its a wake-up call.
His press conference lasted just a couple questions.
Oilers netminder Devan Dubnyk, who earns just 800,000, outplayed Ilya Bryzgalov, the Flyers' 51 million man, in earning his first shutout of the season.
At the end of the night, there is probably 15 quality chances, Laviolette said. And the guy made saves on them. Could we have gotten traffic on some other shots? I dont know. Maybe.
Granted, Dubnyk didnt face 55 shots like the Jets Ondrej Pavelec did this week, but he was just as effective with 35 saves.
We didnt put as much traffic on net as we usually do, Danny Briere said. Lots of shots but he could see most of them. Not a lot that were very dangerous.
The opening period was very much like the game itselffairly uneventful, though the Flyers outshot the Oilers, 14-9. It was 10-3 at one point.
Dubnyk had a couple of quality saves in close on Wayne Simmonds, who has been on a tear lately with five goals in his last five games.
Jaromir Jagr, who has a light touch around the net, muffed a chance with 7:00 left only because he didnt put a lot on it and had it blocked by Ryan Whitney with an open angle at the post.
Scott Hartnell, who had a couple hartnelldowns that period, had three shots on Dubynk that period.
We dont have a chance to play them a lot, but obviously, he played a pretty good game, Claude Giroux said of Dubnyk. He made some key saves for them and we had a lot of chances. He was the best player on the ice.
Bryzgalov had one very good save that stood out in the periods final two minutes when he robbed Ales Hemsky on a one-timer in the slot.
Once upon a time, the Flyers' penalty kill was a legit strength of this club. Lately, its been sinking faster than Newt Gingrichs popularity ratings.
Edmonton badly outplayed the Flyers in the middle stanza. By the end of it, the Oilers were outshooting the Flyers, 24-20.
Our second period was flat, Briere said. They really took it to us and took control of that period right off the get-go. We didnt respond. It took us too long to respond, too.
Less than four minutes into the period, Edmonton broke a scoreless deadlock on its first power play.
Whitney shot one from the point off the back boards. Although Bryzgalov anticipated the rebound, it came out so fast at a perfect angle to Taylor Hall, he couldnt recover as Hall buried his 22nd of the season.
If youre counting, thats four consecutive power-play goals given up by the Flyers, going back to Winnipegs 3-for-3 adventure earlier this week.
There was nothing Bryzgalov could do about Halls goal, but he truly botched Jordan Eberles shot a few minutes later.
Flyers defenseman Braydon Coburn turned the puck over in his own end when Eberle, who leads the Oilers in goals, shot from 32 feet off Bryzs left pad. The puck dribbled across the goal line for his 27th marker.
A brutal goal, making it 2-0. Again, this is where your goaltender has to make a crucial stop off a turnover. It didnt happen.
The periods closing minutes saw Hartnell hit Magnus Paajarvi on the knee. Earlier that same shift, Corey Potter nailed Hartnell. Hartnell was given a deserved kneeing penalty, putting the Flyers back on the penalty kill where they again seemed timid instead of attacking the puck.
Hartnell insisted his hit there was not retaliation.
I was going to the bench at the end of a long shift and the guy washes past a little bit and I finished my check, Hartnell said. It was unfortunateI am definitely not out there to hurt anybody. I play hard.
Not at all retaliation. We all went after Potter after that and nothing happened. We had some chances to score on that same shift. Definitely no quid there.
E-mail Tim Panaccio at tpanotch@comcast.net