Fleury, Penguins score solid win over Oilers
PITTSBURGH — Marc-Andre Fleury and Jordan Staal bounced back from poor performances along with the rest of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
One day after being pulled early in the second period of an uninspired loss to Montreal, Fleury stopped 28 shots. Staal had a goal an assist 24 hours after what general manager Ray Shero called a “horrible” game and the Penguins beat the Edmonton Oilers 5-1 on Sunday.
“I’ve learned it’s a long season and there’s just going to be some tough ones and bad nights,” said Fleury, 3-0 this season in games after being pulled. “You have to be able to put them behind you as fast as possible, forget about it and just move onto the next game.”
Shero told the National Post that Staal was “horrible” on Saturday, being a minus-2 with one shot on goal. Staal responded with his fourth multipoint game of the season, going plus-2 in 18 minutes, 54 seconds — the most ice time among Penguins forwards.
Staal also took a stick to the face while sitting on the bench during Saturday’s game.
“It wasn’t my best effort against Montreal,” Staal said of Saturday’s 3-0 loss, “and I wasn’t feeling all that great with the way I played. I wanted to come out with a better effort.”
Chris Kunitz added two goals, Tyler Kennedy had three assists, and Max Talbot and Zbynek Michalek also scored for Pittsburgh, which reached 40 victories (40-22-8) for the fifth consecutive season and moved to within three points of Eastern Conference-leading Philadelphia.
Ryan Jones scored in the third period for the Oilers (23-38-9), who completed a five-game trip that began with a win in Colorado but ended with four losses.
Playing without scoring leaders, Taylor Hall, Sam Gagner and Ales Hemsky, who were all sidelined because of injury, Edmonton was held to fewer than two goals for the fourth consecutive game.
“It’s been a tough trip. We knew it was going to be a tough trip regardless of our lineup,” goalie Devan Dubnyk said.
