GAME RECAP: Oilers 4, Bruins 0

EDMONTON, AB – Stu and the Oilers were brewin' in Beantown.

Netminder Stuart Skinner earned the unofficial shutout with 26 saves, while forward Adam Henrique potted two goals as the Edmonton Oilers earned their fourth straight victory on Tuesday night with a 4-0 win over the Boston Bruins at TD Garden.

Skinner missed the final 5:25 of the first period after being run over in his own crease by defenceman Nikita Zadorov, but the Edmonton-born shot-stopper remained perfect upon his return from concussion protocol, making clutch save after clutch save to secure his 16th victory of the season in what was a complete performance from top to bottom by the Oilers.

"It was amazing," Skinner said of his team's performance. "I think the way we've been defending has been very impressive. You can tell just by the number of shots that we give up throughout the night, but I think even when you see a team come in and get a lot of shots, we're still defending really, really well and keeping things to the outside and just battling. A great team effort here tonight. It's hard to get wins in this building, so it feels good to get one."

Henrique notched two goals to record his first multi-goal game in an Oilers uniform, and captain Connor McDavid scored a power-play goal on a breakaway at 11:11 of the second period – his 16th goal of the campaign that wouldn't have been possible without Stuart Skinner making a monstrous short-handed stop on Pavel Zacha seconds before Ryan Nugent-Hopkins found McDavid to go in alone and end his eight-game goalless drought.

"A good game from everybody. We were solid throughout from start to finish and top to bottom," Henrique said. "I was fortunate to get to get the two goals, but Nuggy and Davo made a great play on the power play, and Stu took the hit and made big saves at key times, so a lot that went right tonight."

Winger Jeff Skinner pushed his point streak to three games with an assist on Henrique's second goal that made it 3-0 with 3:25 to go in the second period, while Leon Draisaitl had his 14-game point streak end in the victory just one shy of the German setting a new career high.

Defenceman Brett Kulak recorded two assists, and Viktor Arvidsson added an empty-netter to cap off a terrific showing for the Blue & Orange that marked their fifth straight win in Boston.

The Oilers are 15-4-1 in their last 19 games and will continue their four-game road trip on Thursday at PPG Paints Arena against the Pittsburgh Penguins.

FIRST PERIOD

It doesn't matter what coast they're on – that was another wicked-solid first period from the Blue & Orange.

After crushing the Kraken on the West Coast for two goals and outshooting them 10-4 in the opening frame this past Sunday, the Oilers battered the Bruins in the opening 20 minutes in Boston, outshooting them 14-4 and scoring the opening goal for the sixth straight game thanks to Adam Henrique's fourth goal of the season.

Henrique took a pass from Corey Perry from below the goal line and went top shelf on netminder Jeremy Swayman for the 1-0 lead 6:33 into the contest, giving the 34-year-old his 10th career goal in an Oilers uniform since arriving from the Anaheim Ducks ahead of last season's Trade Deadline.

"Get them on and off the tape," Henrique said. "Warren Rychel says, 'Always shoot a rolling puck,' so you gotta be there and just try to make that quick play."

The Oilers came into Tuesday's tilt in Boston 15-3-3 in games this season where they scored the opening goal.

Perry and Brett Kulak garnered the assists to give them points in back-to-back appearances, while Kulak – fresh off celebrating his 31st birthday on Monday – got on the scoresheet during the same shift where he was crushed in the Bruins' zone by a hit from centre Mark Kastellic.

Kulak was no worse for wear from the hit, but the next collision for the Oilers would be a bit more concerning after Stuart Skinner was flattened in his own crease by the on-rushing Nikita Zadorov, who made no attempt to avoid the netminder as he cut to the net and came directly through the blue paint.

Skinner exited the game due to concussion protocol, resulting in Calvin Pickard taking over between the pipes for the final 5:25 of the opening frame before he returned to between the pipes for the start of the second period. Skinner was told by Head Athletic Therapist T.D. Forss on the ice that if the call came from the concussion spotter to get him looked at, he'd have no choice in going to the dressing room, but the netminder had no issue with the decision.

"I think they get a call from Toronto. T.D. warned me when we were on the ice," Skinner said. "He asked me how I was feeling, and obviously with all the protocol he's got to do, he just said, 'I don't really have too much control, so if they call down, you've got to come out.' It is what it is.

"They called down, and honestly, it's a smart call. He got me pretty good. I think that's like the fifth hit I've got this year, but he apologized at the start of the second period, which was really nice of him to do.

"It's an NHL play and it happens."

SECOND PERIOD

As you can see, Stuart Skinner is going to be just fine.

With the help of a clutch save from the Edmonton-born netminder on a short-handed breakaway for Bruins' centre Pavel Zacha, the Oilers were able to counter up the ice and get a breakaway of their own, where Connor McDavid made no mistake at the end of an exciting sequence to double his side's lead.

"Honestly, you kind of think about it even when you're doing the concussion protocol," Skinner said. "You're kind of thinking, 'If I go back out there, I've had a lot of time to sit on it, and I gotta go back and bring my game.

"Especially in the NHL, if you take a second off, it can really hurt you. So I think I proved to myself that in situations like that, which I'm guessing is going to happen again at some point in my career, I can come back in and do my job."

With Trent Frederic getting two extra minutes for roughing Perry before they dropped the gloves, Skinner denied Zacha with an emphatic blocker save before McDavid was sprung on a breakaway through two Bruins' defencemen by Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, going in alone and electing to shoot blocker side on Swayman for a power-play goal that broke the Oilers captain's eight-game goalless drought.

"If he doesn't make that save, it's probably a completely different game," Knoblauch said. "But he makes that save, we score, and then we were able to cruise through the game."

McDavid was all over it on Sunday in Seattle with six total shots and hadn't scored since Dec. 19 on home ice against none other than the Bruins. No. 97 was pointless in his previous two games and wished for a goal to prevent himself from recording the sixth stretch of his career where he didn't record a point over three games – a wish that fittingly came true at 11:11 of the second period.

Swayman was the only reason that the Bruins didn't find themselves down by a larger margin, with the netminder making a good reaction glove save on Nugent-Hopkins early in the frame before he stopped Darnell Nurse on a two-on-one inside the final five minutes of the period.

But the Bruins' shot-stopper was a one-man team on Tuesday, and the Oilers would make it three before the break on Henrique's second goal of the game where Edmonton's newly-formed second line of Zach Hyman, Henrique and Jeff Skinner all factored in with points.

Charlie Coyle committed a careless giveaway below his own goal line by sending it up the boards for Hyman, who intercepted the puck and moved it back down low to Skinner, leading to the winger finding Henrique in front to snap his 11th goal of the season under the right arm of Swayman for his first multi-goal game with the Oilers.

"Just trying to time it and be in the right spot and go to where the puck's going to be," Henrique said. "Perrs was in his office behind the net on the first one, and then Skinny, we had a few of those looks from behind the net earlier in the game and he found me too on that second one. So I'm just trying to time it and get there when the puck's going to arrive and I was able to bury both of those."

Jeff Skinner's primary assist gave the 32-year-old winger points in three straight games (1G, 2A) and helped the Oilers to a 3-0 lead entering the third period, having gone 19-2-3 this season in games when leading after 40 minutes.

THIRD PERIOD

Despite Stuart Skinner's brief exit in the opening period breaking up any chance for him to earn the shutout, his work was far from done after more than doubling his shot total in the final frame and coming up with every stop he needed to earn the unofficial clean sheet in Beantown.

The Bruins began to press with their hopes of a comeback dwindling, starting with a power play six-and-a-half minutes into the third period that saw Ty Emberson break up a Grade-A scoring chance with his stick to help the Oilers kill off their league-leading 49th penalty on their last 53 opportunities (92.5 percent) since Nov. 12.

After the penalty expired, Brad Marchand had a golden opportunity to get one back for the home side, but an excellent stretching stop from Skinner denied the Bruins captain before he kept out another Marchand chance at the left post later in the same shift.

The Oilers had their own man advantage with 6:40 remaining while Marchand was in the box for cross-checking Emberson in the corner, but once again, Skinner had to come up clutch, stopping John Beecher on a short-handed break when he tried to go five-hole with his effort.

"I think it's just the details of our game and areas that we talk about a lot, like the middle of the ice and not giving those up, and that takes everybody," Henrique said of the team's all-around defending. "And when there are breakdowns too, Stu and Picks are there to make big saves. So again, it's a complete team thing, and guys know that's an area that we always have to take care of no matter who we're playing."

Head Coach Joe Sacco pulled Swayman for the extra attacker with over four minutes still to play in regulation in a last-ditch attempt to get the Bruins on the board, but after Viktor Arvidsson tried to find Leon Draisaitl for an empty-netter that would've stretched his point streak to a career-high 15 games, the Swedish forward sent it into Boston's goal to seal the 4-0 victory for the Oilers with 3:35 to play.

Skinner joked post-game that having his shutout wiped was payback for Pickard, who had the same thing happen to him last year when he was on his way to securing a clean sheet in Pittsburgh before he was forced off by the concussion spotter late in the second period.

Pickard finished with 41 saves that night in a 4-0 win over the Penguins despite not getting credit for the shutout, and just like Pickard tonight, Skinner made no saves in the brief time he was in the crease.

"It was honestly pretty funny just because when it happened, I looked at Cal and I said, 'The same thing happened in Pittsburgh and I stole a shout out from you,' and he was pretty upset," Skinner said. "So I was like, 'Well, I guess we're even now.'"

"It is what it is. Shutout or no shutout, it's not that big of a deal. At the end of the day, it's the same same deal."

Along with Skinner's shutout, Draisaitl's point streak was one of the few casualties for Edmonton on a night where they thoroughly outplayed Boston to pick up their fourth straight victory overall and their fifth win in a row at TD Garden.

"There's teams that we want to pass, there's teams that are playing better than us and ahead of us in the standings, and there's teams that want to catch us," Knoblauch said. "If we're not getting better every day, we're gonna get passed, and we're not gonna be able to catch those other teams that we feel that we can. We're obviously happy with our game this last month or so. We've been winning some games, but it's far from perfect. We need stuff to work on."