JIM MATHESON Journal Hockey Writer

How do you measure how damaging a blow Claude Lemieux's OT winner was Friday? If you're the Colorado Avalanche, it's in feats and inches.

Lemieux, who never met an NHL playoff game he didn't like, stuck a knife in the Oilers, beating Curtis Joseph with his 11th shot of the night. It was his third game-winner in the Avs' seven wins this spring, and the sixth straight game he's scored.

It didn't kill off the Oilers, who still have one life left to live, but this was anything but a flesh wound. This was blood (lots of it), sweat and tears time.

Now, the Oil has to beat the Avs in their building Sunday, where the Stanley Cup champs have pummeled teams 44-8 the last nine playoff games.

“The shot? Made it over the line by, maybe, an inch. Maybe two. Went upstairs for a look with the video replay, but you can't sneak anything by that camera anymore. I knew it was in. I wasn't counting on us getting a face-off,” sighed Cujo.

Lemieux found a safe haven for his hopeful shot 8 Yi minutes into OT, just like Gretzky used to do, but only after Joseph had made a huge save, almost as good as the signature stop he made on Joe Nieuwendyk in the seventh game of the Dallas series.

Only this time, Todd Marchant wasn't rushing up the ice to beat the other goalie. He had a shot earlier in OT, but Patrick Roy stoned him.

Cujo robbed Valeri Kamensky too, on a 2-on-l with Lemieux, but Lemieux followed up for his third OT playoff winner.

“I couldn't believe it when Cujo made the first save. I thought I held onto it long enough for Vai. The puck went free and I had time to take a look. I noticed he wasn't hanging by the post. I got lucky,” said Lemieux.

Maybe. This guy is a tremendous playoff performer. He's got 73 goals in 174 games. “I couldn't believe all the chances I had before that, hitting the post, Cujo stopping me,” he said.

Nobody was surprised he got the winner after Bo Mironov, who played almost 33 minutes the first three periods, pinched and got caught.

“Bad play. My mistake. I didn't think they'd get a third guy in there, Kamensky,” said Mironov.

“Claude understands more than anybody at playoff time that your intensity has to be so high. He's an intense guy and he knows how to control that emotion and use it to his advantage,” said Avs' coach Marc Crawford, who leaned on Lemieux to fill the huge hole with Peter Forsberg out with a concussion.

The Oilers could have won this one themselves if Marchant, who'd beaten Patrick Roy on a short-handed breakaway in the second period, had done it again.

“Hey, he scores there and that's the play of the week,” said Avs' Mike Keane, who watched Marchant bat the puck out of the air and take off.

“Six more inches. I just needed it six more inches higher,” said Marchant, who whipped a backhand long side on Roy who got the leg out.

“We kept noticing that he was weak on the stick side, so we were going there,” said Marchant.

But Roy saved the Avs here after giving up a softie through his legs to Ryan Smyth in the second period to give the Oilers a 2-1 lead. Marchant had tied it, stealing the puck off Adam Deadmarsh and sailing in for his second short-handed goal — the first was in the opening game against Dallas. It was a carbon copy of his OT winner in Game 7 to beat the Stars, hard to the far side, only not quite so high.

This was a ride on the wild side, though, just as it was in Game 3 when the Oil rallied with two goals in the last six minutes to win 4-3. A tremendous game for both teams.

“What a great building. Loud. I'm proud to be a western Canadian. But I don't think I want to come back that badly for a Tuesday game,” said Keane.

For the second straight game here, the Avs quieted the raucous crowd, scoring in the first three minutes. Kamensky got his eighth goal, slipping a blind backhand past Cujo. The Avs, smelling blood, had five 2-on-l breaks in the shaky defensive period for the Oilers, but they came up dry.

The Oilers, dodging all the bullets in the first period, scraped back with their two in the second.

But Sandis Ozolinsh tied it on a powerplay late in the period, taking Lemieux's feed, about two feet outside the crease. It went to video replay but it was a wishful try by the Oil.

“Our sticks came together at the same time and it flipped past me,” said Joseph.

In the OT, maybe the Oil was just due to lose one. They'd won all three against the Stars after the worst OT record in regular season (1-6-9).

“I don't know about that. We had chances, too. This isn't a devastating loss. The way I look at it,” said captain Kelly Buchberger, “is we've been through this once before as a young team in 1990. We were down 3-1 to the Jets and dug deep and won.”

OK, history's on their side.

But the math looks awfully Tough. the Avs have been dynamite at home.

“It's not over yet, but we're closer than they are”, said Lemieux who always cuts to the chase.

“We're still breathing,” said Oiler Doug Weight. True enough, but they may need those oxygen tanks that they've been storing behind their bench at McNichols Arena the first two games. This is last-gasp time, folks.

“What can you say? The guys played a marvelous game. I guess we'll see how resilient we are. We've been awfully good in the playoffs,” said Ron Low.