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Arnason helps Avalanche complete perfect homestand

Dec 16, 2006 - 6:26 AM DENVER (Ticker) -- While captain Joe Sakic and Pierre Turgeon had their goal-scoring streaks halted, the Colorado Avalanche still managed to conclude their homestand with a perfect mark.

Tyler Arnason had a goal and an assist and Sakic set up a pair of tallies as the Avalanche scored four unanswered goals en route to a 4-1 victory over the Edmonton Oilers.

Entering with wins over Carolina and St. Louis in the first two games of its three-game homestand, Colorado fell behind Friday before storming back against Edmonton.

Arnason helped start the comeback by recording his 100th career assist on Milan Hejduk's goal late in the first period and capped it with his 10th tally of the season just over three minutes into the third.

Defenseman John-Michael Liles and rookie Wojtek Wolski scored second-period goals for the Avalanche, who extended their winning streak to a season-high three games.

"Putting three solid games together is kind of nice," Liles said. "The big thing is, even when we're up 3-1 and 4-1, we still have to be better. We are still making a few mistakes, but we'll keep working on it and keep trying to correct them."

Peter Budaj made 18 saves in his third straight start and blue-liner Brett Clark added two assists for Colorado.

"We played very good tonight," Budaj said. "We only had 19 shots against, and not many of those were big chances. Also, our penalty kill was tremendous. The last two PKs, we haven't given up a shot on net."

"We didn't get enough shots at their goaltender," Edmonton's Jarret Stoll said. "We had some good shifts down there but nothing to generate any offense. I can't tell you what it was or what we didn't do, it was just we didn't get enough pucks to the net."

Rookie Marc-Antoine Pouliot netted the lone tally for Edmonton, which has lost its last three road contests.

"We played predictably lethargic," Oilers coach Craig MacTavish said. "It's disappointing because I thought the game was there for us early. They didn't look like they had a lot more jump early. They got a little bit as the game progressed."

With just one goal in his previous 16 career games, Pouliot gave the Oilers a 1-0 lead with 4:29 remaining in the first period. Drafted 22nd overall in 2003, the 21-year-old received a pass from Toby Petersen in the slot but got off a weak shot.

However, Budaj misplayed the puck, allowing it to go off the heel of his glove and into the net for Pouliot's first tally since April 3.

Colorado needed just 2:06 to pull even as Hejduk scored his 11th of the season from the right faceoff circle.

"The trigger was their first-period goal," Colorado coach Joel Quenneville said. "They had come out with a good road period and got a fortunate goal. Milan got us a fortunate goal right back and Peter responded after that."

Liles provided the most entertaining goal of the game at 2:42 of the second session. Beginning from behind his own net, the 26-year-old carried down the right side and unleashed a wrist shot from the right circle that was stopped by netminder Dwayne Roloson.

The rebound came right back to Liles, who pushed it into the crease before Edmonton defenseman Matt Greene knocked it over the goal line, giving the Avalanche a 2-1 edge.

Wolski netted his eighth tally with 9:42 to go in the middle period and Arnason fired a shot from the high slot past Roloson at 3:11 of the third to provide the final margin.

"I thought we were getting shots right off the bat," Wolski said. "Sometimes you don't get all the bounces, but to come back and score a couple of goals was huge."

Sakic had his four-game goal-scoring streak snapped and Turgeon saw his three-game run come to an end.