Edmonton Oilers forward Matt Hendricks (23) celebrates his third period goal against Boston Bruins. Oilers won 3-2. (Perry Nelson-USA TODAY Sports)


By Stephen Harris in Edmonton/Boston Herald (TNS)


According to NHL lore there are are two situations in which teams frequently do not play well: When a club is playing its first home game after a long road trip; or when one is coming off a lengthy layoff between games.
That described the Edmonton Oilers and the Boston Bruins, respectively, last night. And the pair played a game that was far from a classic.
The Oilers were just a little better, eking out a 3-2 victory when Jordan Eberle was the lone scorer in a shootout. Thus ended the B's five-game winning streak—a stretch with a few games in which did not really play all that well. This was another.
"I think we were very average," B's coach Claude Julien said. "Our skating legs were there, but we didn't play a hard game—and that's what we needed. We needed to skate and play hard against this team.
"We choose to play a little bit more there type of game. We were going up and down. There were some plays being made, but there was also a lot of chances traded. That's not the way we play," Julien added.
The B's knew a win last night was important, in what was almost certainly their final game at the Oilers' 41-year-old arena—unless the B's and Oilers meet in the Stanley Cup finals, and what are the odds of that? The team moves into a massive new downtown arena next season.
The Oilers took a 1-0 lead on a shorthanded 2-on-1 in the middle of the second period—the first SHG allowed by the B's this season. The Bruins answered with a fluke Torey Krug score (No. 2) off a defender late in the second.
But then at 9:22 of the third, the Oilers caught the B's for a 2-on-1 break, and ex-Bruins farmhand Matt Hendricks went hard to the net and tipped in a pass from Mark Letestu, giving the home team the 2-1 lead.
Desperate, the B's finally started playing with determination in the final minutes of regulation. And Zdeno Chara tied the game at 16:39, sneaking down between the hashmarks, taking a passout from David Krejci and popping in a forehander.
"I thought when we tied the game, 2-2, all of a sudden we started playing our game," Julien said. "Had we played like that the whole night, I think we would have had a better result."
Instead, the B's let the Oilers, the last-place team in the NHL standings, set the tone most of the night.
"I thought we were skating, but I don't think we were finishing our checks or playing them really hard," Krejci said. "It was a lot of up and down. We've got to play skill teams like that a little bit harder. We were ready, I thought. At the end of the day, we got a point. That's disappointing, but we still have a chance to get five out of six points on the road."
This was the start of a three-game B's trip that also includes games tomorrow in Calgary and day after in Vancouver.
Both team had chances in the 3-on-3 OT, with the Oilers getting a power play for the final 1:06 after Matt Beleskey drove Ryan Nugent-Hopkins into Tuukka Rask. There was furious pressure on Rask & Co. but they held on to get to the shootout.
It was a great win for the home team, but a pretty uninspired effort by the Bruins. Now 13-0-2 in their last 15 games vs. the Oilers.
"We definitely need to be better," Chara said. "We played a team that worked hard and obviously has a lot of skill. We didn't have our best game. We certainly have to work much harder, winning more battles and races. It just wasn't good enough.
"We got a point out of it but I think we realize that if we keep playing like this it's just a matter of time before we burn ourselves."
The Oilers were probably reasonably pleased to get to the first intermission with the game scoreless—the B's less so. It was a fairly lifeless 20 minutes, without a great deal of high-energy play at either end.
The Bruins definitely had the better chances, including a pair by Beleskey, who had a very good night, with a game-high seven shots on goal. He was stoned a few times by imposing goalie Anders Nilsson, who was excellent. Ex-Islander Nilsson has earned the No. 1 job here, as key acquisition Cam Talbot has been a disappointment.
Nilsson gave his team a chance to win last night. And the B's didn't do enough to prevent that from happening.
Results (Home team in CAPS)
WINNIPEG 6    Toronto 1
NY ISLANDERS 2    NY Rangers 1
EDMONTON 3    Boston 2
Tampa Bay 2    ANAHEIM 1