PROJECTED LINEUP: Oilers at Sabres

BUFFALO, NY – Goaltender Stuart Skinner is looking to win his fourth straight start as the Edmonton Oilers head to KeyBank Center to continue their seven-game road trip with a meeting against the Buffalo Sabres on Monday night.

Skinner has started four of Edmonton's last six games, having won three straight appearances in overtime with a combined eight goals allowed on 79 shots for a .899 save percentage and 2.62 goals-against average in a home win over the Blue Jackets and road victories against the Flyers and Hurricanes.

The 27-year-old is coming off making a season-high 33 saves in Saturday's 4-3 sudden-death victory in Carolina, including 15 saves in the second period that helped improve his record to 7-4-3 this season (.891 SV% and 2.77 GAA) while looking composed and controlled with his movement in the crease.

"I think overall he's played very well," Head Coach Kris Knoblauch said. "We've given up a lot of chances that would put any goalie in a difficult situation. But these overtime wins that we've had lately, he's come up with some big saves late in games in the third period. The other night in Carolina with a few minutes left, there was a kind of backdoor in-tight play that he was able to stop and get a whistle for us.

"I think there have been times that he's made those big saves in overtime. At home, I remember him making a big east-to-west one-timer save, and then Roslovic goes down and scores on that breakaway. So a lot of good things. I think he's been giving us the big save at the big time right now.'

Zach Hyman will be back on the top line next to Matt Savoie and Connor McDavid for the second straight game since making his season debut on Saturday and recording 11 hits and an assist in 23:10 of ice time after missing the first 19 games rehabbing last season's wrist injury in the Western Conference Final.

The 33-year-old, who spent the past five and a half months recovering, is driven to keep building on his injury-impacted playoff campaign last season, where he recorded 111 hits to go with five goals and six assists in 11 contests before suffering a season-ending wrist fracture.

"He took on a new persona during the playoffs last year, and he said he's [going to continue]," Knoblauch said. "I talked to him after the game, and he said, 'I told you I felt good, and it's not going to take me any time to find my game'. It's nice having Zach back not only for the offensive contributions – he made some nice plays and got an assist the other night – but just being a harder team to play against. On the forecheck, he disturbs and disrupts a lot of plays, makes it hard for the defenceman breaking pucks out, and the physicality part of it is important too."

The Oilers will be tasked with shutting down a Sabres outfit that just rallied for one of their biggest wins of the season on Saturday, erasing a three-goal deficit against the Detroit Red Wings to earn a 5-4 overtime win that ended their five-game losing streak. Tage Thompson had a goal and an assist in that one, including a hard drive around the Detroit defence in the third period to tie things up before Mattias Samuelsson scored 1:05 into extra time.

"They've got a lot of speed," Knoblauch said. "You look up front, especially their top lines, they've got a lot of speed, but I think it all starts on the back end. They've got a lot of puck-moving defencemen who can not only make a good pass, but they can also carry the puck out. So it starts with our forecheck and making sure that we put pucks in good spots so we can establish it. When they do break it out, we've got good angles and we're not getting beat up ice."

View the Oilers Projected Lineup vs. the Sabres below:

Savoie - McDavid - Hyman
Podkolzin - Draisaitl - Roslovic
Mangiapane - Henrique - Frederic
Janmark - Philp - Lazar

Ekholm - Bouchard
Nurse - Walman
Kulak - Regula

Skinner
Pickard