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Anderson, Weiss star as Panthers blank Oilers

Dec 12, 2008 - 5:40 AM EDMONTON, Alberta (Ticker) -- Craig Anderson stopped all 41 shots he faced and Stephen Weiss snapped a scoreless tie with just over five minutes remaining in the second period as the Florida Panthers recorded a 2-0 triumph over the Edmonton Oilers on Thursday.

Radek Dvorak capped the scoring with an empty-net goal with one second remaining for Florida, which improved to 5-1-0 in its last six games.

Anderson stopped 13 shots in both the first and third periods and 15 in the second to notch his third shutout of the season and seventh career.

"When I was able to see most everything and control all the rebounds, it doesn't seem like that many," Anderson said of his saves total. "You just kind of watch the shot clock grow, and it kind of builds your confidence a little bit."

"He was awesome. He made it look easy," Weiss said. "He's been solid playing that way for the last three weeks or so. He's still our best player."

Mathieu Garon made 14 saves for Edmonton, which saw its three-game winning streak come to an end.

"When you look at their lineup, you could be tempted to think it was going to be easy. But we knew it was going to be a hard game," Garon said. "They battled really hard and have big guys back there defensively. They just shut us down."

"There's lots of nights after the home (games) that I have criticized the team for the way that they played and the lack of effort. I am not going to do that tonight," Oilers coach Craig MacTavish said. "I don't think it's appropriate. We were inefficient around the net, but it was not totally our undoing tonight."

Although his team was being outshot by a 25-11 margin at the time, Weiss was able to open the scoring with 5:04 remaining in the second period.

With the Panthers on the power play, Weiss wristed a shot from the right faceoff circle that sailed past Garon for his fifth goal of the season.

"Just shoot it quick," Weiss said of his strategy. "I think that's the key, and also (players) being in front of the net screening the goalie, that's key as well. If he sees it, he probably stops it."

Anderson made the slim lead stand, making a plethora of saves that was highlighted by a stop on Ales Hemsky during a breakaway early in the middle session.

"When a forward comes in full speed, he doesn't have the advantage," Anderson said of his save on Hemsky. "I just wanted to just kind of read what he was going to do, and I read shot the whole way, so I was fortunate that he didn't get off the perfect shot that he wanted to."

"That was a real big stop, absolutely," Florida first-year coach Peter DeBoer said. "We know what Edmonton can do, and we were prepared. We held them to the one breakaway, a few 3-on-2s. But other than that, I thought our defensemen did a really good job of keeping the shots to the perimeter and giving Craig a chance to see them all."

The Panthers, who snapped a four-game losing streak to the Oilers, won for the first time in Edmonton since January 5, 1996.