The Edmonton Oilers were shut out for the second-straight pre-season game, falling 4-0 to the Flames in Calgary on Wednesday night.
“There’s things we can do better offensively for sure, but I look at the positives of that game,” Oilers head coach Jay Woodcroft said. “I thought Tyson Barrie played a heck of a game. He showed a lot of leadership. Two games in a row on the road, as a veteran player to come in and perform the way he did I thought that was excellent. I thought Philip Kemp turned in a really good game. Pickard in net played really well and there was some good signs in our team game. Again, the penalty kill was very good — and some things to build on and some things to work on.”
The first period was scoreless though the Flames carried the play, outshooting the Oilers 13-8.
Brett Sutter opened the scoring for the Flames in the second, chopping a loose puck past Oilers netminder Calvin Pickard.
“It’s exactly what I wanted in the preseason; coming in and playing against the big guys,” Pickard said. “Obviously you want to win the preseason, but at the same time you want to get back into game shape and face a lot of tough situations. The first ten minutes was tough, it was a lot of zone time, but I thought after that we settled in pretty good. We just couldn’t get anything past him.”
Pickard stopped 16 of 17 shots before being replaced by Stuart Skinner. With 3:24 to go in the second, Calgary’s Michael Stone blasted a slapper past Skinner to make it 2-0.
Flames defenceman MacKenzie Weegar came in from the point and made it 3-0 with 3:34 left in the third. Calgary forward Jonathan Huberdeau scored an empty-netter to round out the scoring.
Flames goaltenders Jacob Markstrom (12 saves) and Dustin Wolf (nine saves) combined for the shutout. For the Oilers, Pickard stopped 16 of 17 shots while Skinner turned aside 14 of 16.
The Oilers will continue the pre-season with a home game against the Flames on Friday. You can listen to the game live on 630 CHED beginning with The Faceoff Show at 5:30 p.m. and the game at 7 p.m.
Comments