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Cooke leads Canucks to overtime win over Oilers

Jan 6, 2007 - 7:12 AM VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Ticker) -- Thanks to Matt Cooke, the Vancouver Canucks kept on rolling.

Cooke scored two goals, including the game-winner in overtime, as the Canucks stretched their winning streak to six games with a 3-2 victory over the Edmonton Oilers.

Defenseman Kevin Bieksa recorded a pair of assists and Roberto Luongo made 26 saves for Vancouver, which has beaten Edmonton twice and fellow Northwest Division rival Calgary three times during its current run.

"It's a tough league to win in, a tough conference, a tough division," Canucks coach Alain Vigneault said. "Anytime you get on a roll, it's going to really help us down the line."

Cooke scored an unassisted goal at 7:53 in the second period to snap a scoreless tie, but it was his tally in overtime that sent the home crowd into a frenzy.

Ryan Kesler gathered a loose puck in his own zone and passed to Kevin Bieksa, who led a rush up ice. Bieksa made a cross-slot feed to Cooke, who slapped a shot past goaltender Dwayne Roloson from the right side to hand Edmonton its second loss beyond regulation in as many nights.

"It was a 2-on-0 and Roloson came right out at Bieksa and bit on the shot," Cooke said. "Kevin made a great, patient play when he slid and made a great pass. He made the right play."

"Kesler made a great play to get the puck and Bieksa does a good job of jumping up in the play," Vigneault added. "Obviously, you want your Ds to become part of the rush. We've been getting a lot of offensive production from our defense lately."

Vancouver is 9-1 beyond regulation this season.

"We've been getting some huge goals in overtime," Luongo said. "Again tonight, Bieksa made a great play getting it up to Cookie for the big one. We've been doing that all year."

The Oilers dropped a 6-5 shootout decision to the Dallas Stars on Thursday, when they squandered a three-goal lead but tied the contest with two seconds remaining in the third period.

In this one, Edmonton drew even with less than three minutes to go in the third.

Ales Hemsky, who netted the equalizer against Dallas, skated behind the net before dishing to Petr Nedved. The former Canuck's shot was stopped by Luongo, but Petr Sykora buried the rebound with 2:56 remaining.

"It's never satisfying when you don't win," Oilers right wing Ryan Smyth said. "Obviously, it was a great effort by Petr Sykora and that line to score and get us the point. But we've got to recognize how important these points are against divisional opponents."

Roloson made 21 saves for the Oilers, who have been held to three goals or fewer in each of their last eight road games.

"I liked our game," Edmonton coach Craig MacTavish said. "I thought we played well, much better than we had been playing. A nice goal to get the tie and much the same as last night, we get another sense of disappointment to tie the hockey game and then lose it in overtime."