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Arnott's OT goal lifts Predators over Oilers

Mar 4, 2009 - 5:52 AM NASHVILLE, Tennessee (Ticker) -- Jason Arnott scored a power-play goal in overtime to lift the Nashville Predators to a 6-5 win over the Edmonton Oilers on Tuesday.

Steve Sullivan added two goals and an assist, David Legwand scored twice and J.P. Dumont finished with three assists for the Predators, who have won five straight.

"It was a hard-fought game," Arnott said. "We knew they were going to come out on all cylinders. They never quit, and we never quit. We're just glad we came out on top of it with the two points."

After Jason Strudwick drew a high-sticking penalty at the 1:25 mark of overtime, Nashville set its offense and worked the puck around to Shea Weber at the left face-off circle. Weber unleashed a slap shot but missed everything, bouncing the puck off the boards behind the net.

The puck found its way to the right face-off circle where Arnott found it an unleashed a blazing shot of his own, beating Dwayne Roloson for the game-winner.

"I knew Roloson was scrambling," Arnott said. "And the shot before that, I knew I hurt him a little bit because he went down. He was just scrambling all over the place, and I just tried to get it on net. I knew (Sheldon) Souray was coming out to block it, so I had to get it by him. That's a big body.

"I missed a few open-netters tonight, so it was nice to get that one."

The teams combined for five goals in the third period, with the Oilers grabbing the first two to turn a 3-2 deficit into a 4-3 lead at the 5:15 mark.

"We stuck with it," Souray said. "We took the lead there in the third. We showed some guts."

But Sullivan responded to tie it at the 7:56 mark, taking a feed from Arnott and stuffing it past Roloson to make it 4-4.

Sullivan gave the Predators the lead 70 seconds later when Dan Hamhuis found him for his sixth goal of the season.

"It's a huge win," Nashville goaltender Pekka Rinne said. "The guys did an unbelievable job in the third period. I almost gave it away with a soft goal at the end, but the guys really responded. Sometimes it goes like that. Sometimes I'm helping them, and sometimes they come through big for me."

Erik Cole's 16th goal of the season tied it at 5-5 with 6:08 left in the game for Edmonton, which has dropped two of three.

"We were too tentative to start overtime," Oilers coach Craig MacTavish said. "We lost the first faceoff, and we were retreating ever since. We got that unfortunate break when Struds took that penalty. They have the makings of a pretty good 4-on-3 unit with Weber, Arnott, Dumont, and Sullivan. They did what they needed to do to win the game."