Vancouver Canucks managed to take the win at Rogers Arena on Saturday night with a 4-1 win over the Edmonton Oilers in the pre-season finale for both teams.
The Canucks did have a shaky start to the game, surrendering three 2-on-1 rushes to the Oilers before the game was five minutes in. Goalie Roberto Luongo, who stopped 28 of the 29 shots he faced, kept the Canucks in the game early.
As a recap:
Vancouver grabbed a 1-0 lead at 13:51 of the first when Hodgson scored his second goal of the pre-season. It came on a Vancouver power play when Hodgson tipped a Dan Hamhuis shot past Khabibulin.
The Oilers were the better team in the second and were rewarded for their efforts at 5:08 of the second when Magnus Paajarvi shovelled the puck past Luongo during a lengthy goal-mouth scramble. The goal came on an Edmonton power play.
Hansen beat Edmonton goalie Nikolai Khabibulin from the left circle after being set up with a pass from the corner by Higgins. Malhotra started the play when he stripped the puck from Oiler defenceman Theo Peckham.
Mikael Samuelsson and Cody Hodgson, with his second of the night into an empty net, added late goals to give the Canucks the three-goal cushion.
Samuelsson beat Khabibulin short side at 19:15 of the third from the right faceoff circle. Hodgson’s second of the night came with just 1.2 seconds remaining.
Jannik Hansen combined with linemates Manny Malhotra and Chris Higgins to score the winner at 5:36 of the third period.
Hansen stated,
“It’s nice to get the win. We finished a lot better in the third period than we did in the first two. We gave up a lot of chances early that we definitely don’t want to do and put our goalie in that position.”
Vancouver finished the exhibition schedule with a record of 3-5. The Oilers were 5-3.
