A BATTLE WON

EDMONTON - The Battle of Alberta is back.
The drama.
The intensity.
The nail-biting madness of 'anyone's game' in a heated, one-goal contest down the stretch.
It was crunch time, and the road team prevailed.

When the drivers have a night like that, to be as good as they were against a bitter archrival on the second of back-to-back nights, there was only one way this would go.
The 'Johnny and Gio Show' got a head start on the upcoming All-Star Game with a Saturday clutch-fest, each potting a massive goal to stake the Flames out to a 2-0 lead, and combining for five points in a 5-2 win over the Edmonton Oilers on Saturday at Rogers Place.

"Games are always important when you're playing against other teams in your division," Gaudreau said. "But when you get to play the Battle of Alberta, on a Saturday, Hockey Night in Canada and get a win in Edmonton, it's a lot of fun.
"It was a good team effort. We had a blast out there. It's nice to go back to Calgary with two points."
Gaudreau extended his point streak to a new career high of 11 games in the victory. He has 10 goals and 22 points in a span dating back to Dec. 31, 2018.
Giordano, Elias Lindholm and Matthew Tkachuk also extended their point streaks in the win, going seven, seven, and eight straight games, respectively, with a notch on the score sheet.
With the Oilers mounting a powerful third-period surge, Mikael Backlund put this one to bed with a snipe off the far bar and in with 3:45 to play, off a turnover from rookie D man Caleb Jones.
The goal was Backlund's 300th career point.
Sean Monahan's powerplay marker at 16:03 rounded out the scoring, as he finished off a beautiful centering pass from Tkachuk.
Oliver Kylington also found the back of the net, and David Rittich made 22 saves in the victory.
"5-on-5, we played really well," said Giordano, who's now tied with Brent Burns for the league lead in scoring among defenceman with 52 points. "We didn't give up many scoring chances all night. I thought their looks came 4-on-4 or on their powerplay, so we did well. We had some big, timely goals, a couple powerplay goals. ... They starting climbing back into it, but we stayed calm, and [that] was a big goal by Backs to ice it."

With the win, the Flames improve to 32-13-5, and now have a six-point cushion on first place in the Pacific.
"It was a big win, for sure," Backlund said. "It means a lot to the team to show our strength in the third again. Found another way to win. It's great to see the character in this room, how everyone digs in.
"Penalties made it a little back and forth and slowed the game down a little bit, but when we were playing 5-on-5, we dominated and were the better team."
As they were all night, the Flames were far and away the better team in the opening 20, but Oilers goalie Mikko Koskinen held his ground, stopping all 14 shots he faced, including a save-of-the-year candidate on a late powerplay for the visitors.
Gaudreau took a seam pass from Lindholm and got a quick shot off at the edge of the near circle, striking the blocker-side post and watching it pinball between that and the body of the netminder.
Feeling something was amiss, Koskinen immediately reached back with his opposite hand, trapping the puck between his glove and the post and keeping the game in a 0-0 tie.
But not for long. The Flames outshot the Oilers 14-6 in the first, and 34-24 overall.

"I liked the way we played on a back-to-back," said head coach Bill Peters. "We're playing well and that's as tight as we've (defensively) been in a while. I don't think we gave up much 5-on-5, so it was a good night."
Gaudreau made amends with a beauty off the rush in the opening minute of the second to give his team a 1-0 lead. No. 13 took the puck full flight, driving wide and opening up the goaltender before firing a shot five-hole to score his 29th of the year at the 45-second mark.
The Oilers had a great chance to get back into the game as the captain picked up a double minor for high-sticking Connor McDavid at 3:11, but the Flames easily killed it off, and even drew a powerplay of their own late in the infraction, and took full advantage with the No. 1 unit out to capitalize.
Out of the box, Giordano raced to a loose puck in front of the net, out-battled a pair of defenders en route, and cashed on the second effort in tight, backhanding the puck over the sprawling netminder to give the Flames a two-cobb lead at 7:29.
The Flames opened up a three-goal edge off another strong shift that saw the visitors pin the homeside in their own end of the rink for an extended period of time. Kylington vacated his post at the left point and travelled down to the right circle, awaiting a pass. Backlund hit him with a beauty across the seam, and Kylington made no mistake on the one-timer, slapping it five-hole at 15:29.

Ryan Nugent-Hopkins got one back for the Oilers with only 17.8 seconds left in the second period to set the score at 3-1, and Milan Lucic added one more early in the third to make it a one-goal game, but the Flames held serve, calming the game down and scoring two unanswered goals in the final five minutes to earn a critical two points in the standings.
"It makes it a lot easier down the stretch to have a little bit of a cushion," Giordano said. "They're a big rival, they're a team that's right on the bubble and who knows what can happen, right? You can end up facing a team like this in the playoffs.
"We'll take the win and move on, but we definitely want to keep piling up the points."