Edmonton’s Fans Turn on Gretzky in 4-0 Win

The Trade is finally complete. Wayne Gretzky belongs to the Los Angeles Kings. The Edmonton fans have let him go. Kissed him goodby.

In fact, the Oiler fans booed Gretzky Saturday night as Edmonton was shutting out the Kings, 4-0, to take a 2-1 lead in their best-of-seven National Hockey League playoff series that continues tonight with another game at the Northlands Coliseum.

In their frenzy for another Stanley Cup, the Oiler fans forgot all about their love for Gretzky.

Gretzky’s old buddy, Mark Messier, slammed into him with reckless abandon. Grant Fuhr, the goalie Gretzky praises to the heavens, robbed him time and time again and left him pointless for the first time in 19 straight playoff games.

The mixed emotions felt by Gretzky and former Oilers Marty McSorley and Mike Krushelnyski when they played their first few games here during the regular season, were long forgotten.

Asked if it seemed to be getting easier to play against his former teammates, McSorley said, evenly and deliberately: “I resent the question.”

Point made, loud and clear.

Gretzky was saying just the other day that by the end of this series, all the emotional issues of the trade of last August would be put to rest.

They’re gone, a little bit ahead of schedule. May they rest in peace.

“Life goes on,” Gretzky said. “I mean, in a way it’s kind of nice. Now we can stop talking about the trade.

“I’m not an Oiler, I’m a King. That’s the way it goes. I never expected to get cheered when I came back. That’s the game; what do you want me to say? It’s kind of funny.”

Actually, it shows the difference between the regular season (when Gretzky took the ice to a chilling standing ovation) and the playoff season (when his reception was just plain chilling.)

Gretzky played hard. He played to win. But the Oilers took the early lead--2-0 in the first period on goals by former King Jimmy Carson and by Steve Smith, and expanded it to 4-0 in the early minutes of the second period on consecutive goals by Gretzky’s former linemate, Jari Kurri. Once they had the lead, they protected it well.

As McSorley said: “They got the lead and went into a shell. . . . Taking nothing away from a great game by Messier, he was able to carry the puck differently. He was able to control the puck and not press. Gretzky ended up in the position of having to press the puck.”

In their prevent defense, the Oilers took only three shots in the final period. And King goalie Glenn Healy stopped them all.

Kelly Hrudey had started in goal for the Kings and had given up the four goals on just 14 shots when Ftorek decided to make the change.

Ftorek said: “Our goaltender was a little bit dehydrated. He was sweating a lot. He’s been ill, so we went with the game plan we had had for the last few games. We just hadn’t followed through on the plan the first two nights. (Hrudey wasn’t well enough to play in the first game and he stayed pretty strong in the second game). Tonight, we followed through.”

But while Healy was holding off the Oilers, Fuhr was holding off the Kings.

Fuhr dug in. “I think maybe we accepted losses a little too easy earlier in the season,” Fuhr said. “But now that the playoffs are here, I think we’ve got the fear of losing in us a little bit.”

The shutout was Fuhr’s second in 90 playoff starts. He hasn’t had a shutout in the playoffs since May 10, 1984, when he beat the Islanders, 1-0, in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup final series.

Yet, the Kings had their opportunities. They had breakaways by Gretzky and Steve Duchesne in the opening minutes of the game.

The shutout was the first for the Kings in 264 straight games, including 12 playoff games. The Kings had scored in every game since March 12, 1986, and had the longest current streak in the National Hockey League.

Coach Robbie Ftorek of the Kings pulled his goalie with 4:07 to play in an effort, he said, to win the game, not just to avoid the shutout.

“We were shorthanded at the time and we needed four goals,” Ftorek said. “We pulled our goaltender to try to win the game. Hey, you don’t throw the towel in.”

But it’s tough coming from behind in a tight game like this.

Those two goals in quick succession late in the first period gave the Oilers a big boost.

McSorley was in the penalty box for elbowing when Carson scored the first goal. It wasn’t a blatant elbow, and McSorley was “disappointed” in the call. But he was off the ice just the same when Messier fired the puck across to Carson, who was waiting in the slot to slap it off the pass into the Kings’ net.

Just 16 seconds later, Smith made it 2-0 when Esa Tikkanen tipped a rebound back to him for the shot.

“On the second goal, we made a (line) change, and they got a breakaway out of it,” Ftorek said. “Kelly made a big save. We didn’t pick up the coverage as well as we could have, as well as we should have, and they scored on the next shot.”

In the second period, Kurri scored his consecutive goals 1 minute 11 seconds apart, getting a short-handed goal off a pass from Messier and then banking another shot in off the right post after Mark Lamb had centered the puck back out front to him from the right side of the net.

Four goals in less than nine minutes of game time. The crowd had the building rocking. Ftorek called a timeout, and the Kings tried to regroup.

At least they didn’t give up any more.

“We can’t panic,” Gretzky said. “We needed to win a game here and we have another game Sunday.”

King Notes

The fourth game will begin tonight at 5 p.m. and will be televised by Prime Ticket and broadcast by KLAC (570). . . . Mike Allison played Saturday night, coming back from a back injury. . . . Wayne Gretzky, Marty McSorley and Mike Krushelnyski were on the ice at the Northlands Coliseum for the game day skate Saturday morning when the Oilers were given their individual replicas of the Stanley Cup trophy they won last season. Nice timing on the part of the Oiler front office to motivate the Oilers to defend their Stanely Cup title. No one came into the Kings dressing room to give former Oilers Gretzky, McSorley and Krushelnyski their silver trophies. “We’ll probably get ours next February,” Gretzky said.