Oilers Hope They Can Stick Around : Hockey: Gretzky, Robitaille team up to take advantage of defenseless Lamb for winning shot in Game 1.

Wayne Gretzky’s eyes got big. Real big.

A tiger spotting its prey doesn’t move any quicker. Or more decisively.

It was overtime Thursday night at the Forum, Game 1 of the Smythe Division finals between the Kings and the Edmonton Oilers. Oiler defenseman Steve Smith caught his stick in the glass partition, snapping the wood.

Anybody on the ice without a stick is in bad shape, but particularly a defenseman. So forward Mark Lamb made the percentage move, tossing Smith his stick.

Fine for Smith, but that left Lamb defenseless. Unfortunately for Edmonton, Lamb was standing in the Oiler zone, the last line of defense in front of goalie Bill Ranford.

Gretzky took that all in immediately and got the puck to Luc Robitaille at the top of the left circle.

“I saw somebody had lost their stick,� Robitaille said. “Somebody yelled, ‘No stick!’ It might have been me.�

Robitaille might not know what he said, but he knows what he did. He moved into position at the top of the circle and whipped the puck past Lamb, who had fallen to his knees in a final desperate attempt to block the shot. Instead, it sailed past Lamb and over Ranford’s right shoulder for the winner.

Edmonton will try to rebound in Game 2 of the best-of-seven series at the Forum at 7:30 tonight.

“When a player doesn’t have a stick, you can pass the puck right by his feet and he can’t do anything about it,� Robitaille said. “It’s a whole different game then. If (Lamb) had a stick, he might have tried to poke-check me. But because he didn’t, I knew I had more time. I had one more second to get a little closer.�

When it was over, the inevitable celebration ensued, players leaping on Robitaille, hugging him and cheering him in his moment of glory.

So what’s it like in that ultimate instant of individual triumph for a hockey player, winning a playoff game in overtime?

“It’s almost like it’s happening to someone else,� Robitaille said. “It’s hard to explain. But the important thing is that the team won. To tell you the truth, I felt exactly the same way when Gretz scored in overtime to beat Vancouver.

“When it (Robitaille’s winning goal) happened, it’s like the end of the world, but now (a day later), it’s no big deal. It doesn’t matter if we win 3-2 or 6-1 as long as we win. We feel like this is our big chance this season and we don’t want to miss it.�

In the Oiler locker room, Smith, who is 6 feet 4, couldn’t help but kid about receiving a stick from the 5-9 Lamb.

“I break mine and I get half a stick back,� Smith said.

In retrospect, he figured his broken stick was probably still bigger than the one Lamb had flipped him.

One man has won four Stanley Cups. The other won last season’s Cup.

Still, there was some surprise Thursday night when Edmonton Coach John Muckler chose to start Ranford in goal in place of Grant Fuhr.

Since he returned from a half- season suspension after admitting to a drug habit, Fuhr has won the starting job back from Ranford.

Fuhr was in the net when the Oilers dominated the latter half of the 1980s with four Stanley Cups. But when Fuhr was injured at the end of last season, Ranford stepped in and played brilliantly throughout the playoffs, leading Edmonton to a fifth Cup and winning the Conn Smythe Trophy.

But Ranford hadn’t played since the next-to-last regular-season game on March 29. Logically, he would be rusty. And he had hardly been a brick wall against the Kings this season, going 1-4-1 with a 4.19 goals-against average and a save percentage of .848.

Muckler, however, cited different statistics, dating to last season when Ranford was nearly unbeatable in the Oilers’ sweep of the Kings in the second round.

“Coming in here, Billy had stopped 45 shots,� Muckler said. “He had beaten L.A. four times last year. His history is he plays well in this building. Grant had played seven consecutive games.�

Coming off a grueling seven-game, opening-round series against the Calgary Flames, including overtime in Games 6 and 7, the Oilers had to be tired against the Kings.

The Kings figured to have a larger edge in Game 1 than in any succeeding game. What better time to give Fuhr a needed rest and roll the dice with Ranford to see if any of the playoff magic remained?

But for tonight and probably the rest of the way, look for Fuhr.

There was much speculation before Game 1 about the condition of Edmonton center Mark Messier, who had a slight hamstring pull in his right leg, a bruised left leg and a bone chip in one thumb.

King defenseman Larry Robinson knew Messier would be out there anyway.

“Even skating on one leg he’s as good as most hockey players,� Robinson said. “Just his presence out there means a lot to that team. He’s been their leader. Any Mess is better than no Mess at all.�

King Notes

King center Steve Kasper, who suffered a concussion in the third period Thursday night, is not expected to play. That means Coach Tom Webster will either have to move someone else up to center or cut out one of his lines and go with three. . . . Oiler defenseman Kevin Lowe, who has tendinitis in an ankle, and wing Joe Murphy, who has flu, both sat out Thursday’s game but might return tonight.