Oilers Trap the Predators in 4-0 Victory

The Edmonton Oilers laid a trap for the Nashville Predators on Monday Night at the Bridgestone Arena and massacred the Predators with a 4-0 thrashing.

In previewing tonight's game, Coach Barry Trotz proved to be a prophet saying, "It's not a trap game if you respect your opponent and play the way you are going to need to play. It's going to take a great effort to beat Edmonton."

The Predators did not have a "great effort" nor even a decent effort as they started strong and quickly fizzled. On the other side, the young Oiler's team got a lead, built confidence, and never looked back.

The Oilers got goals from Andrew Cogliano, Ryan Jones, Jordan Eberle, and Dustin Penner. Their big weapon on the evening was Devan Dubnyk, who recorded his first career shutout stopping all 37 Predator shots.

Pekka Rinne had an off night allowing four goals on 20 Oiler shots before getting a rest in favor of Anders Lindback with 12:57 left in the contest.

The Predators started the game completely controling the pace, out shooting the Oilers 10-1 in the first ten minutes. In spite of the dominating play, the first crack in the dike came at 14:27 when the Oilers put a couple of shots on Rinne with Cogliano finding net on the second attempt.

In the second period, at 14:23, ex-Pred Jones got the thrill of the game scoring on Rinne off a cross ice pass from Colin Fraser.

The Oilers third goal was a travesty of justice when Jim Vandermeer fired a shot from the right circle and Eberle plowed over Rinne and was credited with the goal.

Trotz was clear on his opinion of the play, "The third goal shouldn't have been a goal. It was totally interference. We scored a goal in Philadelphia where we never touched the the goaltender and it got called back, but Pekka gets run over and they allow that?"

The Oiler's final goal, that sent Rinne packing at 6:58 in the third, was on a breakaway by Penner where he went five hole and that was the icing on the cake for the Oilers. At that point, the only question was if Dubnyk would hold on for the shutout which he did.

The bottom line was that on this given night, the Oilers were the better team. Trotz gave them full credit, "They had good focus, blocked a lot of shots, and Dubnyk did a good job. It was a little frustrating, but I don't want to take anything away from them. They played a real solid game."

The Predators will practice on Tuesday morning and then travel to Detroit for a rematch with the Wings on Wednesday at Joe Louis Arena.

More Later...

Buddy Oakes for PredsOntheGlass