The Edmonton Oilers celebrate Teemu Hartikainen's (left) goal during the third period against the Phoenix Coyotes at Rexall Place Saturday afternoon. Codie McLachlan/Edmonton Sun
It was a classic case of better late than never — if the Edmonton Oilers hadn’t scored late, they were never going to save this season.
They still might not, with nine in a row on the road coming up, but they at least gave themselves a fighting chance, coming back from 2-0 down to beat the Phoenix Coyotes 3-2 in a shootout Saturday afternoon at Rexall Place.
It was a crucial victory for an Oilers team that came into the contest in 13th place, having gone 1-3 through the first four games of the five-game homestand.
And it looked bad early, after Phoenix opened the scoring 5:23 into the first period. Not only were the Coyotes 31-13-5 against Canadian teams, they were a staggering 105-13-15 when scoring first since head coach Dave Tippett took over in 2009.
And when they made it 2-0 on a second period power-play marker from Matthew Lombardi, the writing seemed on the wall.
