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Garon, Gagner, Hemsky propel Oilers past Flames

Feb 5, 2008 - 6:18 AM EDMONTON, Alberta (Ticker) -- Curtis Joseph made his first start this season, but Mathieu Garon stole his thunder on Monday night.

Garon made 24 saves to register his fourth shutout of the campaign and rookie Sam Gagner and Ales Hemsky each scored a goal and set up another as the Edmonton Oilers cruised to a 5-0 victory over the Calgary Flames.

Fernando Pisani, Dustin Penner and defenseman Steve Staios also tallied for the Oilers, who learned earlier that leading-scorer Shawn Horcoff would miss the rest of the season after he undergoes shoulder surgery later this week.

Edmonton proved it did not need its assistant captain in this one.

"There are only two ways you can deal with losing your best player," Staois said. "One is to use it as a crutch and an excuse and the other way is to come out and give your best, and we did that tonight. Every aspect of our game was going tonight."

Garon turned aside seven shots in the first period, eight more in the next and nine in the third to secure his 14th career shutout.

Joseph, who was seeing his first action since signing with the Flames 18 days ago, stopped 23 of the 28 shots he faced.

Pisani opened the scoring at 6:24 of the first period after accepting a centering pass from rookie Andrew Cogliano. Joseph blocked Pisani's first attempt but the 31-year-old right wing stuffed in the rebound.

The Oilers grabbed a 2-0 lead with 35 seconds left in the opening session as rookie defenseman Tom Gilbert found Geoff Sanderson streaking along the wing, but the veteran's shot was stopped by Joseph.

Sanderson was able to corral the rebound and whipped a perfect pass to Penner in the slot and he ripped his 16th goal of the season over Joseph's shoulder.

Edmonton's fortunes continued to improve as it picked up its first of three power-play tallies on a weird bounce of the puck.

Jarret Stoll's shot from the point rebounded to Gagner, who took a shot in Joseph's direction. The puck appeared to hit blue-liner Cory Sarich before redirecting off Hemsky and going into the net to give the Oilers a 3-0 edge.

On the play, Stoll collected his 100th career assist. He picked up another one later in the game on Gagner's tally.

As the margin widened, the game grew more physical. Edmonton's Zack Stortini tangled with Sarich, earning the duo a fighting double-major at 9:18 of the second period and a vicious slash from Alex Tanguay earned the Flames left wing a trip to the penalty box at 12:49 of the second.

Tensions fully boiled over at with 12:58 left in the game, when just about every player on the ice came to blows. Calgary's Eric Godard received a goaltender inference penalty, a fighting major and a game misconduct.

"That shows complete lack of discipline," Calgary coach Mike Keenan said of Godard. "It was a very undisciplined play that will cost him in the end because he's going to be suspended - that's his third game misconduct and he probably knows that - so I have no idea why he acted the way he did. It's certainly not condoned by our coaching staff and our team."

As a result, the Oilers received a seven-minute power play and notched two more goals on the man advantage. Staios scored on a slap shot from the top of the left circle with 8:29 left and Gagner added another 75 ticks later to provide the final margin.

"He's plenty tough," Oilers coach Craig MacTavish said of Gagner. "For an 18-year-old kid, he stuck his nose in again tonight. He's got all kinds of skill and played pretty well."

For Joseph, his first stint as the Flames goaltender was one that he would rather forget. His highlight of the night was the near-brawl he had with Garon during the melee in the third period.

"It happened last year, too," Joseph said pointing to a game the Oilers played in Los Angeles last season. "When you're outnumbered like that, you've got to at least go to the red line, and then he backed out of it."