The Edmonton Oilers snapped a three-game losing streak, earning a 3-2 win over the Tampa Bay Lightning Tuesday night in a game that saw forward Evander Kane suffer a scary wrist injury.
With 16:40 left in the second, Kane was knocked to the ice. Patrick Maroon’s left skate went over Kane’s left wrist while Kane was down. Kane rushed to the Oilers bench, leaving behind several spots of blood on the ice.
After the second period, the Oilers tweeted, “After suffering a wrist injury early in the second period, Evander Kane is stable and has been transported to hospital for a procedure later this evening.”
“Once an accident like that happens on the ice, that’s where our first thought is,” head coach Jay Woodcroft said after the game. “It’s never fun to see one of your teammates in that kind of position.”
In a statement on Twitter Wednesday morning, Kane said he was on the mend.
“Thank you all for the kind wishes and prayers from over the past several hours,” he said. “Obviously last night was an extremely scary moment for me and I’m still in a little bit of shock.
“I would like to thank the entire training staff of the Edmonton Oilers and Tampa Bay Lightning, along with the all the doctors and paramedics who rushed to help treat and repair my injury. Without all of you, I know things would’ve been much worse and I’m sincerely grateful.”
Kane said he will not be back for the Oilers next game, but that he will be back eventually.
“I look forward to being back on the ice playing the game I love alongside my teammates in front of our great fans.”
The Oilers much maligned penalty kill provided the first goal of the game when Warren Foegele beat Andrei Vasilevskiy with a long wrist shot. It was Foegele’s first goal since April 16.
“I thought I had a chance to try to attack. Coach just kept telling me to shoot, and I shot, and this time it went in,” said Warren Foegele. “It was a massive relief.”
The Lightning tied it on a three-on-two with Brandon Hagel converting a pass from Nikita Kucherov.
Two minutes into the second, Connor McDavid struck on the power play for his league-leading 14th goal of the season. Shortly after Kane’s injury, Leon Draisaitl flipped in a backhand for another power play marker.
Alex Killorn scored 49 seconds into the third. The Lightning kept the pressure on for most of the third but were continually denied by Jack Campbell, who finished with 35 saves. Maroon thought he tied the game with eight minutes left, but his bouncing shot was knocked off the goal line by Ryan Murray.
The Oilers went 5/5 on the penalty kill after going 1/5 Monday against Washington.
It’s the Oilers first road win over the Lightning since Dec. 9, 2009. They’d been 0-8-1 in that stretch.
The Oilers, 8-6, will visit the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday (630 CHED, Face-off Show at 3:30 p.m., game at 5 p.m.).