‘Wild’ finish on their mind in Edmonton Oilers’ rematch against Sabres

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Two weeks.

Two games against the Buffalo Sabres.

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Three endings?

The Edmonton Oilers went into Thursday’s rematch seeking a different result than the one from their latest trip to Buffalo, N.Y., March 9, that capped off with a bit of a strange finish. What had at first been a 3-2 overtime loss actually ended in a 3-2 shootout loss.

Fans were filing out of KeyBank Center and players from both sides were already in the dressing rooms removing their gear when they were suddenly called back out after video replay determined the play was offside on the overtime goal … eventually.

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So, back out the Oilers went to finish out the final 20 seconds of sudden death and the accompanying shootout, only to return with the same single point in hand once again.

And the question heading into Thursday’s puck drop at Rogers Place was, how many endings would we see this time?

“Hopefully just the one,” Oilers forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins said with a laugh at the morning skate. “It hurt a little more losing twice.

“Yeah, it was a weird situation. It gave us another chance, but obviously we didn’t get the extra point anyway.”

Not that they’re complaining any time they can add to their points total in the standings, which is something they’ve been doing a lot of lately.

The Oilers came into Thursday with an 8-1-2 record in their last 11 games, claiming 18 of a possible 22 points.

“Obviously, getting points at any point in the season is very important,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “Right now, obviously when you’re fighting for a (playoff) position, jockeying for a position a little bit, it’s very important. So, we’ll take them any way we can get them.

“I still think we’d like to elevate our game for a full 60 minutes to the point where we know it could be.”

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And it starts against teams like the Sabres, who are on the outside looking in at the playoffs, sitting sixth in the Atlantic Division.

“I thought the other night, it wasn’t like we played a terrible game,” Nugenet-Hopkins said. “But I think we let them control too many parts of the game and dictate the pace a bit probably a little bit in the third and at different points throughout the game.”

But it was the end of the game that sticks out most. Both of them.

“It was a wild game, that’s what stands out, obviously, with the overtime goal that Owen (Power) scored and was called back” said Sabres head coach Don Granato. “And us coming out, I think we had another chance right away but it went to a shootout.

“That’s in memory.”

It was a case of the NHL making sure they got it right, only to the extreme.

“We looked at the goal, we saw it. I saw it on the bench, I saw it in the dressing room and I know our video coaches conferred with the Buffalo video coaches and everyone was in agreement that it was a good goal,” said Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch. “We got clarification from the NHL a few days after and they had video that we did not have.

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“There was a frame in between what we had that changed the decision. So, the quality of the feed was what we thought it was going to be and they had something else and changed the outcome of prolonging that game.”

The Oilers players already had their game sweaters piled in the laundry bins, which had to all be dug back out and returned to their rightful owners.

“It was good to have that clarification and move on,” said Knoblauch, adding the potential for even more video reviews in real time on the bench only adds to an already hectic and complex environment. “It’s putting a lot of pressure on the coaches, and not just myself but mostly the video coaches. They are the ones who review that and suggest whether we should challenge or not.

“Especially with a puck over the glass, is the quality good enough to really see what it went off? You can have a picture and, yeah, it looks like it does but is there confirmation that it did? Now you’re looking at the quality of our video. Offside is one thing. Did the puck go off the stick? I think that takes it to a whole new level.

“I can understand what they’re trying to do. If they got it wrong, let’s definitely get it right. But it makes it tricky.”

E-mail: gmoddejonge@postmedia.com

On Twitter: @GerryModdejonge

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