Vancouver Canucks at Edmonton Oilers

Horvat scores twice in 3rd period, Canucks beat Oilers 5-2

“It’s been an interesting year for us, to say the least, and we don’t have any quit in us, which is a real positive thing, even though we have games where we have breakdowns and letdowns,” Miller said.

Ilya Mikheyev also scored for the Canucks, who have won two in a row and rallied to defeat the Seattle Kraken 6-5 in a shootout on Thursday.

“I’m really proud of the guys the way the guys stepped up,” said Horvat, who has 24 goals this season. “It’s not an easy back-to-back for us with the time change and travel and for everything going on. So, for us to play the way we did tonight, it obviously wasn’t the best start, but we finished strong and (Collin) Delia was really strong for us tonight.”

Derek Ryan had a goal and Connor McDavid scored his league-leading 30th of the season for the Oilers, who have lost four of their last five.

“It’s unacceptable,” Oilers forward Zach Hyman said. “We had a really good start and were up 2-0 and were the fresher team and then they scored five unanswered. Obviously, you can’t win like that.

“If you want to make the playoffs, you can’t keep wasting points.”

Vancouver got a bizarre goal just 41 seconds into the second period as a shot by Miller deflected high into the air off of Edmonton goalie Stuart Skinner and then hit his back and caromed into the net.

“I haven’t scored in a while, I was just going for a change,” Miller said. “I saw it went up, and I thought there might be a chance that it was going to go. I actually didn’t know how it went in. I was just surprised and I kind of laughed, because I’ve had a ton of chances and none of them have gone in — and that’s the one that goes in.”

Collin Delia made 31 saves for the Canucks. Skinner finished with 25 saves.

McDavid said his team needs to wake up quickly.

“It is a little bit like whack-a-mole,” he said. “One problem pops up and you solve that and then another one pops up. It is just consistency throughout our whole game — five-on-five, penalty kill, power play — all of it needs to be consistent on a more nightly basis.”

NOTES

Canadian men’s national soccer team star and Edmonton native Alphonso Davies made a ceremonial faceoff. … Nugent-Hopkins tied Jari Kurri for the seventh-most games played in an Oiler uniform. … Spencer Martin got the start on Thursday against Seattle, so Delia got the call against the Oilers. Martin had started eight consecutive games since usual Canucks starter Thatcher Demko sustained a lower-body injury on Dec. 1 against the Florida Panthers. … Also out for Vancouver were Tanner Pearson (hand) and Tucker Poolman (undisclosed). … Missing with injuries for Edmonton were Evander Kane (wrist) and Philip Broberg (undisclosed). Oilers forward Ryan McLeod returned after missing 13 games with an ankle injury.

UP NEXT

Vancouver: Host San Jose Sharks on Tuesday.

Edmonton: At Calgary Flames on Tuesday in the first of a two-game trip.

Series tied 1-1