Oil Kings Take 4-2 Win over Memorial Cup Hosts

Saskatoon, SK - The Oil Kings jumped out to an early lead and held on to post a 4-2 win over the Saskatoon Blades on Wednesday.  Laurent Brossoit had 31 saves while Captain Griffin Reinhart led the way with two goals as Edmonton improved their record to 3-0-0-0 against the Memorial Cup hosts. The Oil Kings raised their overall record to 33-11-2-3 on the year as they remain first in the WHL Eastern Conference standings.

David Musil opened the scoring for the Oil Kings with a seeing-eye wrist shot through traffic for his fifth of the season. Musil continues to thrive on the Oil Kings top shutdown pairing with Keegan Lowe. Since arriving in Edmonton he has posted three goals, eight assists and a plus-11 rating. Edmonton improved their record to 26-4-0-1 when scoring the first goal of the game.

Henrik Samuelsson wired a wrist shot off the post and in for his 25th of the season to make it a 2-0 game. The Oil Kings leading goal scorer added to his total with eight minutes remaining in the first period. Samuelsson has five points in his last three games and his 25 goals rank him 14th in the WHL goal scoring race.

The visitors took a 3-0 lead just minutes later as Reinhart ripped a shot from the point through traffic for a power play goal. The goal was the Captain's fourth power play marker of the year and would stand as the eventual game winner. Edmonton's number one ranked power play finished the game 1 for 4 on the night.

Lukas Sutter responded for the Blades on a late first period power play to give Saskatoon new life. After being out-shot 19-7 in the first period the Blades would bounce back in the final two frames. The score remained locked at 3-1 as the Blades pressured throughout the second but could not beat Brossoit.

Saskatoon made a game of it early in the third as Josh Nicholls tallied two minutes in to make it a 1 goal margin. But superb defending and great goaltending from Brossoit allowed the Oil Kings to hold off a frantic Blades attack. Reinhart then notched his second of the game to restore a two goal lead for the visiting side with under five minutes to play.  

Brossoit's 31 save performance raised his record to 21-6-2-3 on the season. "LB" has an amazing 1.29 GAA and a 0.960 save percentage in the month of January. The MVP of the 2012 WHL Championship continues to dominate allowing only 13 goals in his last 10 games.

The win was Edmonton's third in a row as they lifted their road record to 14-6-1-1 on the year. The Oil Kings are now tied for second in the race for the WHL regular season title with the Kamloops Blazers.

The Oil Kings will make their return to the City of Champions this Saturday as they play host to the Brandon Wheat Kings. It's Championship Hat Night at Rexall place as the Oil Kings dish out 1000 replica WHL Championship hats! All fans at the game will be eligible to receive a hat thanks to the Oil Kings new scratch-and-win tickets issued at the doors! Game time is set for 7:00 p.m. at Rexall Place.

BUY TICKETS

Tickets are available at OILKINGS.CA, at the Rexall Place Box Office or at Ticketmaster outlets. For more information on season seats or flex packs, call 780-414-GOAL (4625). All games this season will be broadcast live on the TEAM 1260 and streamed live at WHL.ca. The Oil Kings 2012-13 season is presented by JLT, Insurance & Risk Management