Darnell Nurse scored twice to lead the Edmonton Oilers to a 4-2 comeback win over the Arizona Coyotes Friday night.
For the sixth time in the last seven games, the Oilers fell behind 2-0.
Brad Richardson scored just 2:03 into the game. Josh Archibald tallied 1:14 later as the Coyotes scored on two of their first three shots.
That ended the night for Cam Talbot in the Oilers net as he was replaced by Al Montoya.
The Oilers woke up later in the period when Nurse blasted a slapper past Antti Raanta.
In the final minute of first, Connor McDavid swooped into the slot and dished to Oscar Klefom. Klefbom set up Patrick Maroon for a tap-in to tie it 2-2.
Four minutes into the third, Nurse took a drop pass from Leon Draisaitl and drilled another one by Raanta’s glove. A couple of minutes later, Montoya made excellent pad saves on Richardson and Jordan Martinook.
Milan Lucic took a tripping penalty with 3:49 left, but the Oilers were able to kill it off.
Ryan Nugent-Hopkins sealed it with a late empty net goal.
“It was nice to see us be resilient and come back,” Nurse said. “It could have been easy for us to say ‘here we go again’ and that wasn’t the case.
“We continued to make plays, and once the goals started to go in, we continued to play and found a way to win the game and that’s a big step for us.”
Montoya stopped all 19 shots he faced.
“You want to go in and just give them a chance,” said Montoya, who earned his first win as an Oiler. “Bounces didn’t go our way right out of the gate. A lot of character for this team, the way we hung in there, battled back, got the two points. It goes a long way.”
The Oilers, 19-23-3 on the season, improve to 7-2 against the Pacific Division. They’ll visit the Vegas Golden Knights on Saturday.
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