PREVIEW: Oilers vs. Lightning

The Edmonton Oilers wrap up their four-game homestand against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Saturday.

You can watch the game on Sportsnet & Hockey Night in Canada at 8:00pm MT or listen live on the Oilers Radio Network, including 880 CHED. Subscribe to Oilers+ to unlock exclusive live and behind-the-scenes content.

PREVIEW: Oilers vs. Lightning

EDMONTON, AB – Back at it and looking to bounce back against the Bolts.

After being blanked 4-0 by another Florida club in the Panthers on Thursday, the Oilers will be back in action at Rogers Place to close out a four-game homestand against the Lightning in the final matchup of Hockey Night in Canada on Saturday.

Facing their rivals from the last two Stanley Cup Finals, the Oilers started strong on Thursday but saw their emotions fall short of matching the level they needed to beat the Panthers, who scored twice in the first period and cruised to victory behind 21 saves from Sergei Bobrovsky for the shutout.

Looking back at the tape at Friday's practice, Mattias Ekholm said not raising their emotions early was one of the biggest takeaways from a disappointing night where two valuable points were on the line in a matchup that should've been easy to get up for.

"I'm sure there are a bunch of things, but I thought the emotion of the game is the biggest thing," he said "We could have been a little bit more engaged early on.  I felt like the first was not good enough.  I thought we got going a little bit, but at the end of the day, we need to be a lot better. I don't think there's one point you can just point at. I think that there were multiple."

Head Coach Kris Knoblauch said that he thought his side had some good moments, but lacked connectedness in their passing and speed following a day off on Wednesday, which led to more puck touches for the group during Friday's skate at Rogers Place.

Having missed Leon Draisaitl the last two games, Friday was also a chance for the Oilers to work on their power play after going 0-for-3 against the Panthers on Thursday.

"Just get a little bit better and work on the power play a little bit," Knoblauch said. "Without Leon, we haven't had much practice time to work on it.  Today we had a little bit of time, and practices in between games are tough to get a whole lot done in, but we did some puck touches and got the guys moving. We wanted to have a fast practice, a lot of puck touches and hopefully that helps us tomorrow night."

The Panthers had plenty of injuries of their own in names like Sasha Barkov, Brad Marchand and Sam Reinhart, and the Oilers' list continues to grow itself after forward Trent Frederic was injured in the second period and will be out with no timeline to return.

Frederic had been playing well over the last pair of home games in a fourth-line role with Max Jones and Adam Henrique, but his new injury now puts him on Edmonton's list of unavailable players that includes Leon Draisaitl, Colton Dach, Mattias Janmark and Curtis Lazar.

Called up from Bakersfield on Thursday, forward Roby Jarventie is poised to make his Oilers debut after taking regular line rushes in Frederic's spot on the fourth line.

The Lightning lost six of their previous eight games before starting their annual Western road trek through Seattle, Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary, winning by identical 6-2 scorelines over the Kraken and Canucks as they look to keep it going in the first of a back-to-back on Saturday against the Oilers.

In the battle for the Hart Memorial Trophy as League MVP, Nikita Kucherov is right there with Connor McDavid and Colorado's Nathan MacKinnon, having recorded eight points (2G, 6A) over Tampa's two straight wins to give him 114 points (38 goals) in only 63 games this season, owning a League best 1.81 points per game.