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 | On the strength of a three point night from forward Brett Pollack and a near perfect performance from netminder Tristan Jarry, the Edmonton Oil Kings took a commanding 3-1 series lead over the Medicine Hat Tigers courtesy of a 4-1 victory in Game Four of the Eastern Conference Finals. Edmonton now needs just one more win to reach their third consecutive Western Hockey League Final, | | Edmonton - April 24, 2014 - The key to success for the Edmonton Oil Kings in Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Championship comes down to one word: patience.
The Oil Kings took until the 7:16 mark of the second period to break a scoreless deadlock, but just kept coming at the Medicine Hat Tigers en route to a 4-1 win Wednesday night at Medicine Hat Arena and a 3-1 series lead in the best-of-seven conference final.
“Just keep peppering him with shots, that’s how we play,” said Brett Pollock, who finished the night with two goals and an assist. “We knew one was going to go in.”
Griffin Reinhart broke the 0-0 tie with a wrist shot from the slot, beating Tigers netminder Marek Langhamer for the first time in over 80 minutes of hockey, opening the floodgates for the Oil Kings.
“You’ve got to give credit to Langhamer: he was great last night, but we knew he can’t stop everything, so getting that first one was big for us, and we just kept rolling after that,” Pollock said.
After squandering a chance to break open Game 3 on a five-on-three power play, the Oil Kings converted a two-man advantage late in the second, with Pollock notching his seventh of the playoffs on a big rebound with 7.2 seconds left in the period.
“To get the second goal on the five-on-three was huge,” said Oil Kings head coach Derek Laxdal.
“We ran a different unit and ran our second route that we wanted to run, and we got a little fortunate. Last night we didn’t get fortunate.”
Luke Bertolucci tipped a point shot from Dysin Mayo to put Edmonton up 3-0 6:52 into the third, and Pollock rounded out the Oil Kings scoring with his second of the night with 3:37 to play.
Tristan Jarry made 22 saves for the Oil Kings to pick up his 11th win of the playoffs, while Langhamer had 26 saves for Medicine Hat.
The Tigers’ lone goal came on the power play from Cole Sanford with 1:18 to play.
Edmonton will get a chance to wrap up the series at home in Game 5 Saturday night at Rexall Place. Tickets are on sale now through oilkings.ca, the Rexall Place box office or any Ticketmaster location.
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