With the puck nestled in the net and the crowd at Rexall Place roaring, Patrick O'Sullivan threw his arms in the air and looked skyward in a goal celebration that seemed equal parts relief and elation.

A day off paid off for Sam Gagner last night. After sitting out Monday's encounter in Columbus, the Edmonton Oilers centre was back in the lineup, scoring a goal and adding an assist in a 6-4 win over the Colorado Avalanche.

Also on the active roster : D Dean Arsene, D Denis Grebeshkov, G Jeff Deslauriers.

Slava Kozlov hopes his first goal is the start of something good. Kozlov broke out of his slump with his first goal of the season and the Atlanta Thrashers beat the Edmonton Oilers 3-2 on Sunday for their fourth consecutive victory.

The Atlanta Thrashers will try to extend their longest winning streak of the season to four games when they host today's contest at Philips Arena against an Edmonton Oilers club that has been decimated by injuries.

Dean Arsene waited his whole career for the call. For nine seasons, the defenceman has slugged it out in the minors chasing his NHL dream.

Ales Hemsky decided to gut it out. Having joined the team in Ottawa on Tuesday, the Edmonton Oilers winger was back in the lineup last night for the first time in nearly a week.

Denis Grebeshkov is out. From a report we heard and an Oilers twitter confirmation, he injured his knee in the final minute of the Buffalo game and won't be with the Oilers for the final two games of this five game road trip.

Jason Spezza squeezed a shot off the post and under the left pad of Edmonton Oilers goalie Jeff Deslauriers on Ottawa's third shot to give the hometown Senators a 4-3 National Hockey League shootout win Tuesday night at Scotiabank Place.

Jason Spezza scored the winning goal in the shootout for the Ottawa Senators, who twice came from behind to beat the Edmonton Oilers 4-3 on Tuesday night.

Reddox stretches before a game. Photograph by: Larry Wong, The Journal, File, Edmonton Journal Liam Reddox doesn't score a lot of goals, but he's a straight shooter.

Ryan Potulny tallied the eventual game-winning goal and an assist, and the Edmonton Oilers used four power-play goals to post a 5-3 win over the Avalanche and hand Colorado its first home loss of the season.

After missing the last 11 games with post-concussion syndrome, defenceman Steve Staios is ready to re-join Edmonton's beleaguered blueline.

Edmonton Oilers goalie Nikolai Khabibulin makes a save against the New York Rangers during the second period Thursday night at Rexall Place.

Patrick O'Sullivan of the Edmonton Oilers is stopped in the first period of Monday's NHL game at Nassau Coliseum by New York Islanders goaltender Dwayne Roloson.

It could be worse -- head coach Pat Quinn could be in charge of a chaotic and woefully unprepared immunization program that shrugs its shoulders while children and pregnant woman are shoved aside by a stampede of selfish adults.

At least they scored a goal. It's all about small moral victories right now, in lieu of any real ones, for the slumping Edmonton Oilers, and a fruitless two-game road trip that yielded one fluke in 120 minutes is about as small as it gets.

The Edmonton Oilers must all be at Witt's end. The Oilers stumbled to 1-5 in their last six outings after they were spanked 3-1 by the New York Islanders on Monday at Nassau Veterans' Memorial Coliseum.

EDMONTON a ' Ladislav Smid, who contracted the H1N1 virus about two weeks ago, may have passed the swine flu along to his Edmonton Oilers teammates, but he didn't know he had it until Tuesday.

Denis Grebeshkov has been a walking disaster at times this season, but he played 28:54 against the Wings and was plus-1 on a night when the Oilers gave up five even-strength goals.