The Edmonton Oilers owned a 2.87 GA-60 (2.66 expected) at five-on-five through March 21; since then, the GA-60 is 2.22 (2.34 expected) and suddenly the team is No. 9 overall is GA-60 in the largest game state. So today, as Vegas Golden Knights sit in first place in the Pacific (likely to win the division), Oilers fans can take heart: The team is tightening up, and is playing solid defense. The wins are coming, and will be more common when Leon Draisaitl and Zach Hyman return. If you’re looking for a good sign, shaving .50 of GA at five-on-five is a fine place to start.
WHAT TO EXPECT IN APRIL
- At home to: CHI, VEG (Expected 1-0-1) 1-1-0
- On the road to: UTA, SJS, LAK (Expected 2-1-0) 1-1-1
- At home to: COL, VAN (Expected 1-1-0)
- Expected Record: 4-2-1
- Actual Record: 2-2-1
- Season Record: 40-30-10, 90 points in 80 games
The only goal was scored on a turnover at the LAK blue line, Mattias Ekholm under pressure passing to Evan Bouchard under pressure (the entire world knows pressuring Edmonton’s defense is just good business). Bouchard almost got it through, Artemi Panarin was the breakaway man and Connor Ingram couldn’t stop the breakaway. NST judged it less than a high-danger chance, but a Panarin breakaway is pretty dangerous in my experience. You may blame Bouchard on the play, but that was a tough situation and it didn’t work out. I believe Bouchard can improve his turnovers and sense of danger, but he wasn’t trying to make a cute play, he was trying to make the safe play. Your mileage may vary.
- Dach-Samanski-Frederic 7:54, 1-3 shots, 4X, 0-2 HDSC
- Henrique-Lazar-Roslovic 6:40, 3-1 shots, 46X, 0-1 HDSC
- Podkolzin-McDavid-Sovie: 6:05, 1-4 shots, 0-1 goals, 58X, 1-0 HDSC
- Jones-Nuge-Kapanen 2:02, 1-1 shots, 3X, 0-1 HDSC
- Nurse-Murphy 19:16, 9-7 shots, 51X, 4-4 HDSC
- Ekholm-Bouchard 17:01, 4-8 shots, 0-1 goals, 64X, 2-0 HDSC
- Walman-Emberson 10:22, 3-1 shots, 24X, 0-1 HDSC
- Connor Ingram 20 of 21, .952 expected GA 2.85
Connor McDavid played a bunch with many forwards (over seven minutes wit Kasperi Kapanen) in search of clean air but nothing rhymed. The captain saw a lot of the Quinton Byfield line, I thought the young Kings forward was effective. Nurse-Murphy are 7-6 goals in 258 minutes together, that duo appears to be ready for the postseason. Adam Henrique had three HDSC, Trent Frederic and Matt Savoie two each, Colton Dach had one. McDavid and Henrique each drew a penalty, 97 took a couple. I thought both goalies played well and this looked like a playoff game. Oilers still have to win games, looks like it’ll be Anaheim and we’re not certain if it is home or away for Game 1.
CONDORS
Some young Condors are making their marks in pro hockey these days. Tommy Lafreniere scored last night, his second pro game and he’s already on the board. William Nicholl scored in his first game in pro this week, and both men could play in Bakersfield this coming season. Nicholl turns 20 in May, Lafreniere in January, so both could go back to junior. Only Nicholl is signed.
Oilers farm report: Identifying the real future NHL players for Edmonton
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7188579/2026/04/12/oilers-farm-report-samanski-howard-hutson/
Evander Kane for Podkolzin and Lewdowski looks like an absolute theft right now.
Patrick Alvin should be fired but I’m glad he’s giving us gifts.
If that was the trade maybe…
Its going to be the Oilers vs Kings again. Lol.
Bouchard In his draft year
87 points in 67 games
led his team in scoring by 30+ points
Led bad team in +/- at +23
not small at 6’2. How did he drop to 10?
Arizona took a C Barrett Hayton at 5 who had 60 points in 62 games.
also 21 points in 11 playoff games in his draft year+1, our man has always been clutch
Test
I hope it is. Anaheim is -14 goal differential and 11th in the West in regulation wins. Utah is +32 GD and 3rd in RW. And Vegas just might have a new coach bump.
Cutter Gauthier and Radko Gudas returning to the Ducks lineup tonight.
Gauthier scores #39
Why did you stop providing game updates?
Making pizza.
Bowser with a shortie.
Gauthier with his 40th.
3-2 Canucks.
Leo Carlsson with his 29th
3-3
Going to OT.
Any updates?
Canucks win with 12 seconds left in OT.
To assist you with this math problem, this means that the Canucks get two (2) points while Anaheim gets only one (1) point since they lost in overtime.
With the Flames leading Utah 4-0 late in the 3rd, the Mammoth loss sets up an interesting dynamic since all of the Oilers, Ducks and Mammoth will have 90 points with each having 32 game left to play.
“with each having 32 game left to play”
Your math is regressing, somehow.
Suddenly now you are interested in the Oilers? For weeks you’ve been commenting on how just about every other teams’ situation is interesting, but never the Oilers, the team this place is about.
LOl, right.
Translation: Game score was not in line with narrative.
What was the narrative?
That’s what I wonder after every post you make
Seriously, you need to STFU. It’s playoff time and once again you don’t have a team, time for you to take another timeout
Not even man enough to admit it
Good,
The more Godas is on the ice vs 97 & 29 the better
Imo that is not a play that Bouch should make against the other teams most dangerous forward and that lack of awareness is gonna cost him a Norris trophy.
You make it sound like he had a lot of time to think it through. He only had bad options at that point and I think he was trying to make the highest percentage one. Hard to criticize for me.
I think Ekholm kind of screwed him over. And when he saw the pass was going to cause problems, he should’ve been high-tailing it back, seeing that Panarin was on him. But he was also standing flat-footed when the turnover happened.
All he had to do was swat the puck away but he tried to stickhandle around Panarin.
Werenski did essentially the same thing, three days prior to put his team down 1-0 in a must-win game (finished -3 and culpable on two of the goals against).
How can he win the Norris?
We always talk about this team having a high ceiling and low floor. Are we sure?
They’ve shown no ability to handle the good teams right from early October.
Their record against the 100 point teams?
2 wins and 12 losses
In fairness most of those games were pre trade deadline and this is a different team now. Since then we’ve beat the Sens, Vegas twice, Avs, Mammoth twice. We should be good for a couple rounds. Not sure after that
Could just as easily lose in the 1st round,
So much depends on a healthy Ingram & avoiding injury to key players who knows how 29 will be upon return.
Goalies and luck man
Yeah agreed. I’d feel confident against LA or ANA, Vegas a coin flip IMO
OTOH, the Oilers would not be in a playoff position if they played in any of the other three divisions
Speaking of the refs….
Ben Betker, who was drafted by the Oilers in the sixth round in 2013, has been added to the NHL rotation.
The 6’5″ 227 large human recently made his debut after a playing career with Bakersfield, Kalamazoo and 5 seasons in Europe.
https://scoutingtherefs.com/2026/04/51745/referee-ben-betker-set-for-nhl-debut-at-flames-avs/
The NHL’s method for hiring new officials is either asinine malpractice or intentionally harming the game.
Former players with minimal experience…just plain idiotic.
What would you suggest as an apprenticeship?
He spent a season officiating in the BCHL followed by a season in the AHL.
We’re not talking about spitting the atom.
“We’re not talking about spitting the atom.”
Or understanding scenarios in which teams could clinch a playoff spot.
Side, i think its enough……..i kid!
never stop buddy! Never forget!
10 years experience. 5 at an absolute minimum. It should be officials who’ve worked their way up.
I’d also hold being a former pro player as a negative. They don’t have the right outlook, and it clearly leads to the bitter egos you see in the modern NHL official.
I wonder how many minor league referees would hang around to get 10 years experience at minor league pay rates and let’s remember professional level skating has to be part of the package.
I’m not sure excluding former pro players would yield tangible benefits and based on the career paths of almost all current referees might lead to a manpower shortage as experienced who the league adopted the 2 referee system.
Some good background information:
https://nhlofficials.com/officials
The NHL has leaned into this “strategy” in recent years. Nearly every new ref has been a washout turned stripes who gets fast tracked.
It has made things visibly worse.
But what are you suggesting as an alternative?
There are already development camps for officials and on going professional upgrading alternatives.
Officials in junior hockey survive on low per game compensation and have to travel extensively.
AHL pay isn’t all that much better and that league also extensively employs former players.
Where would you recruit all these future pro refs who are willing to earn peanuts for a decade in hopes they get a call to the big leagues?
Maybe they aren’t getting many good officials from the working their way up path?
Working their way up may mean they were too poor of a skater to actually play the game at a higher level so they became officials.
The game is super fast now. Officials gotta be able to skate. I’m sure it’s a very low percentage of people that have ever put on skates that can skate near an nhl level
And their TOI/G is 60 (or more) minutes.
I think there are thousands of minor hockey referees that could do a better job than most of the current NHL refs. Seriously, they are that bad and are never held accountable. I have only watched a couple of mlb games so far this season. I love the new challenge available for ball/strike calls. It will be interesting to see if the umpires end up doing a better job now that they know bad calls can be instantly called out by the players for everyone to see.
Somebody a while back was talking here about how they recruit refs. They moved from taking the best refs from lower leagues to former players
It’s dumb. Makes no sense to me. I think it shows on the ice but Gary thinks all is well. Too bad the fans don’t agree
Years ago one ref could handle games better than two do now, even with the linesman doing more
Agreed. 2 years? One in the bchl? Seems crazy to me.
Yet sure highlighted the lack of puck skill on the Oilers. There’s a such a huge gap between the top few forwards and all the rest of them. This team is cooked without a healthy Drainand Hyman joining a healthy McDavid.
I also thought the game was a master class of playing on the perimeter and working so hard to get the puck to the d-men for a blocked shot or an unscreened shot.
Aside from McDavid, the only forwards that can consistently make plays are Savoie and Podkolzin. RNH struggling like he is really takes the depth away. Getting Draisaitl back healthy is huge and the best chance they have at going back to the Finals
Today is Nuge’s 33rd birthday.
He has only 26 EVP which is 251st in the league.
Someone’s been doing their math homework!
I think it’s Knobby’s system. They’ve been declining each season. People seem to be able to score again when they go elsewhere
How’d Jeff Skinner do this season?
I’m not buying the narrative that Ekholm put Bouchard in a terrible spot on that play yesterday. If you freeze the play when the puck lands on Bouchards stick he has plenty of room to make a safer play. I’m wouldn’t be so annoyed with him if he didn’t make the same mistake a few games ago when Ekholm back checked hard to save his ass. Bouchard is a great player and has had a great season but you can’t make that play in an important game when it is 0-0.
Bouch handles tough problem passes often. Freeze frame is different than game speed. Most players just dump that puck to the corner and Bouch had time to do that. So did Ekholm.
What makes Bouch elite is that he handles that puck hundreds of times a year with only a few turning out badly. The vast majority turn out leading to positive results.
Bouch and the oilers should expect ekholm and other teammates to save his ass when things go wrong.
Cale Makar in olympic final made some terrible “bouchards”…
Like yeah….These guys are handling the highest level of last man back live hand grenade type moments.
The number of times it’s bad without recalling the even higher number of times i’m blown away by the just absolute balls it takes to do sonehow smoothly keeps it in and get around attacking defender….more good than bad. Need to remember both gor context. Cause good gord there are sooo mamy times i can’t believe he kerps it in.
It’s funny that Devon Toews made an absolutely brutal giveaway in the last four minutes of the Gold Medal game. And yet he was *this* close to being the Gold Medal-winning hero. (Only he, Makar, and Harley among the D really provided much offense.)
That’s exactly the kind of thing Team Canada would have gotten from Bouchard. On balance, it would have been worth it.
“Danger Will Robinson, Danger”. Bouchard has a complete lack of that inner voice and awareness. Risk assessment, and risk-adjusted returns become more important at critical moments. Aggregated results do not capture this. Evan Bouchard is akin to shorting vol as an investing strategy (i.e. carry strategies), one makes money 99% of the time, but one gets wiped out because the 1%.
Some investors just refuse to short vol on principle. Which is why some GM’s refuse to pick Bouchard for their teams.
Market makers are typically short vol, and make a lot of money, but have strict risk adjustment rules. But market makers are market makers until they blow up, and then they are not market makers anymore. Scotty Bowman and Glen Sather were market makers. They did not mind Larry Murphy and Paul Coffey, because they had strict risk adjustment rules…i.e. built teams and deployed rosters and utilized matchups to risk adjust for the extreme short vol D they played. Murphy and Coffey only won on teams with elite coaches and GM’s and rosters littered with elite players, that played solid team defense.
High ceiling, low floor, means the Oilers are terrible at risk assessment and adjustment.
Is there empirical evidence that the Oilers and Pens played solid team defense?
The game is played at Mach Jesus not freeze frame analysis.
Why didn’t he see that? Cause he doesn’t have your remote control to figure it out.
Panarin’s a great player who made a great play. Single moments. Any run support and nobody cares.
Ekholm put him in a tough position that his only play that wasn’t high risk was quick decision dump down the boards.
Yes, Bouch should have made that play and that goal is indeed primarily on him, 100%, but I would also suggest:
1) Ek should not have made the pass;
2) One Ek did make that he should have immediately recognized the high risk position and retreated for cover.
Bednar got hit in the face with puck last night and there is damage – facial fractures and a corneal abrasion. Won’t be on the trip. Team will probably be “playing for Bednar”.
Well wishes to Bendar (the intel is no surgery required and he’ll make a full recovery).
Colorado has a lot to play for.
MacKinnon is close to winning the Rocket Richard.
He also has a chance to become the first player in decades to score 100 EVP in a season.
Necas is 1 point short of 100.
However, they lost Josh Manson with an upper body injury last night and no word on a Makar return.
They have recalled Jack Ahcan from the AHL who has 50 points in 60 games with the Eagles.
Nazem Kadri is likely to return to the lineup after missing a couple pf game with a finger injury.
“Necas is 1 point short of 100.”
Well done! Soon you will be doing standings math in no time!
So MacKinnon and Necas has a lot to play for…….
Caufield scored an unbelievable goal to get to 51. A thing of poetry.
Mackinnon got his 52nd on an empty net from 2 feet away, when his teammate refused to take the easy empty net goal, held the puck, and shot it to Mackinnon for the easy tip. The cheapest of cheap goals.
As of right now, Caufield deserves to have his name on the Rocket.
It is crazy that Caufield has zero EN goals.
Neither did Leon that one year (although Leon played defending leads and they just couldn’t score on the empty net….)
As of right now MacKinnon has the most goals which is what the trophy is awarded for.
There is no award for the prettiest goals.
As bad as that is, it also sounds like he is really lucky to not need surgery. There’s been a few close calls this season with pucks hitting players/coaches on the bench. All the best to him in his recovery.
Any chance they give Ike Howard the Drai spot on the PP?
I really hope so. Aside from his time with the Oilers so far, he has only ever played top 6F and PP. I really hope we put him in a place to succeed especially when so many players blocking him are out. I’d also look to maybe try him with McDavid and Savoie to allow Podz to help drive another line with maybe RNH and Roslovic.
They should. This team really needs goal scorers
He’s much more likely to get the wet spot.
Oilers have recalled Issac Howard which I presume means Jones won’t be playing tomorrow.
I’m glad they are giving him an NHL game (or two) and a few days of NHL play over playing Owen Michaels.
Per Ryan Holt:
Last game highlighted how few truly offensively gifted guys the Oilers have right now. Bringing Howard up is the right call. Likely should be a top 6 spot, but who knows.
Nicholl’s goal was on his first pro shift – that dude has a real motor.
Isn’t Lafreniere heading to Western Michigan? I don’t think the ATO and games in the AHL takes away his eligibility for the NCAA.
I have been wondering about Lafreniere, I read he had committed to WMU but it’s odd that he signed the ATO. I can’t recall any other player leaving junior, signing an ATO in the AHL and then going to college the following season. Maybe he’s the first to go this route? With all the new NCAA/CHL rules, I really don’t know myself.
Or maybe management has been able to get him to change his development plan and go pro?
If its the latter, I would presume we’d here about his ELC staring next year, like Nicholl, right?
Good point.
Play that gave 9 more times and the Oilers win it 7-8 times.
I won’t got as far to say that it was dominating but the Oilers did dominate many of the Sportlogiq stats: scoring chances off the rush, scoring chances off turnovers, slot driving plays, etc., etc.
All the face-off loses at the end were truly something – having to put Lazar out there with the goalie pulled in the name of a face-off win is not great (and he didn’t win in).
Lets go beat the Avs.
It will be tough to beat the Avs with all these injuries. They might even have a tough time beating the Canucks. Sorry for the negativity, but I’m seeing them with a first round match up against Colorado. Leo & Zach will both be needed. they’ll need all hands on deck.
You clearly havent seen the Canucks play hockey. Seravalli may have been right about Denver beating them.
Tire fires would call them a tire fire.
I feel there’s been more 1-0 games going both ways over the last few years with the Kings compared to any other opponent. I haven’t looked it up, it just seems it happens more often than it does versus other teams in the West.
Mileage is varying. Bouchard attempted to deke around Panarin instead of dumping it to the corner.
And I’m not the only one… This is exactly what the Bouchard critics talk about (not me btw).
https://x.com/travisyost/status/2043062697995178356?s=20
If it makes any difference the comparisons to Coffey do not impress me. I was never a Coffey fan, and preferred Huddy all day every day. Never cried when he left only to post negative plus minus on the best Penguins teams in history.
I agree with part of this. To me, the safe play appeared to be down the boards to the corner
Are you talking about Hall of Fame defenseman, 4 time Stanley cup champion, record holder for most goals scored in a season (48), Paul Coffee?
Yeah, what a plug that guy was!
Yes the same, “make plays Paul Coffey” who was -18 on the 1991 Penguins.
They won the Stanley Cup & you’re talking about +/-
I hope the Oilers win the cup & Bouchard goes -18
I’ll take that all day & twice on Sunday
I also thought the team was more solid without Coffey, but we would be in the minority methinks
It happened so early in the game, they should have been able to score at least one or two to win that game.
Ya the odds were certainly that Bouch would get that one plus back.
If it’s any consolation, last season, end of season Kings had tons of undeserved swagger and trounced us without key players. Even though we all knew this, it was a gut punch kind of game last year.
This time, that was an even game, with most sites suggesting expected goals were similar (Moneypuck had Oilers ahead) prior to 6 on 5. And that was in spite of a lineup missing key forwards with a combined (pro-rated) ~100 goals/season.
There is a very real possibility now, though, of a WC2 finish, if they can’t muster a point from the Avs. Which is truly less than ideal….
Only the blasted Wild concern me, everyone else the Oilers should feel very confident against unless Drai and Hyman are too injured.
Wild are 3v3 merchants. They won’t get to a conference final imo.
Wild have fewer regulation wins than we do.
In the West, only Colorado, Dallas, and Utah (!) have more.
RW:
COL 46
DAL 37
UTA 32
EDM 31
MIN 30
VGK 28
If you’re judging teams based on that stat, they might just as well cancel the playoffs and award the cup to Colorado now.
Also important to remember that more than a few teams will play the final minutes of a game very conservatively in an effort to gain at least a point in the game.
Lowetide, is there any credence that the referring is biased against the Oilers. Someone posted some daming statistic when Kelly Sutherland refs their games.
Sutherland is a joke and always has been a joke. The NHL does not care one iota about the quality of the reffing.
The Panthers realized that and won 2 consecutive Cups.
The numbers were so crazy I’ve reposted here, from @Yycyegyvr
“The Edmonton Oilers have a 3-12-0 regular-season record over the last three seasons (2023-24 to 2025-26) in games officiated by Kelly Sutherland.”
@Funny Bissonness added:
“Over that same time period that amounts to 2.2% of our wins, 14.0% of our regulation losses and 0% of our Bettman’s.
Oilers point percentage over that same time period:
.605 (7th in the league)
Point percentage with the Sutherland games removed:
.631 (would be 5th in the league)
Point percentage with non-Sutherland games removed:
200 (would be last in the league by a margin of 172)”
Either Yycyegyvr has bad numbers, or there’s strong evidence of malpractice here.
I am still feeling furious that Kelly Sutherland and his obvious bias against McDavids Oilers is allowed to continue. That game had huge playoff implications and the refereeing was atrocious. We are in all likelihood headed for the Avalanche now. Unless we can beat them in our next game. McDavid is going to be exhausted headed into the playoffs with the year he’s had and especially the past weeks with Leon and Hyman out where he has single-handedly been carrying the offense.
The NHL has always had an element of Stampede Wrestling in it.
I was looking his record in Oilers games and the Avs record came up and it is equally atrocious, if it is any consolation (don’t know if he will ref next game)
McDavid played 26:50 last night.
Insane.
I hope you’re right and it’s Anaheim in round one. If the Ducks falter and the Kings slide into the top three, I’ll be disappointed. Not because I don’t think the Oilers can beat LA, it’s just terrible hockey to watch and we’ve already seen it four times. Time for something new. If somehow both Anaheim and LA finish ahead of Edmonton, not good! These last two games still matter, gotta get a few more points
Walman-Emberson 10:22, 3-1 shits, 24X, 0-1 HDSC
That’s the shits…
Have they not played well together beforehand?
Okay, so I need you to explain why this is bad for a defensive pair. The TOI is just a bit more than 1/6 of a game. The job of the defense is firstly to prevent goals.
The stat line equates to roughly:
6 shots against per game – seems decent,
18 shots for in a game – low but great relative to shots against,
6 HDCA in a game – seems not bad.
The only stat that seems questionable to me is the 24% expected goals. A calculated stat like that’s is ridiculously useless in teeny sample sizes.
The high HDCA, which could even be a shot from the slot that one of them blocked, would count as say 15% of an expected goal. Meanwhile a shot which was far more dangerous but not within the narrow area designated as high danger may count as a 1% chance of a goal.
As per LT above, Panarin’s breakaway goal did not count as an HDSC.
So, since my reading of the stat line is positive it would be informative if you could add to my limited statistical knowledge by explaining why it’s the shits.
Someone questioning a stat like xG for defence. Love that.
Now for questioning the validity of sites that dont count Panarin breakaways as dangerous.
Or something as ludicrous as ‘deserve to win-o-meter’
This morning LT had a ‘typo’ which read “shits”. I tried to quote it but it didn’t work, it’s now been corrected. I was having a little fun with our host. Hope that helps you get through your day.
Ha. I actually checked for that but it must have been corrected by the time I looked.
No offense intended.
Im not sure anyone’s noticed but Kaspari Kapanen’s game has fallen off a cliff. In the last 10 games the Oilers have some excellent scoring chance metrics. Yet Kapi is somehow +46/-80 in that stretch.
Nuge at 52/78 not much better.
Both players are complimentary offensive players. With Drai and Hyman out their quality of linemates has decreased and as a result they have been pushed into more feature roles, roles they cannot handle.
Typically kappy is very inconsistent. This year he’s been way more good/great than bad. Hopefully he can get great again for a playoff round.
With Nuge it’s as if he’s fallen off the cliff. I keep expecting him to get over an illness or nagging injury but it’s been a while now. Like many months. He just plays every game in coast mode. I still expect him to recover and be effective when it matters.
Ah my response got caught in filter.
Yes…i have definitely been seeing this quite obvious. Potentially overthinking in play as beimg asked to primary line drive mcdavid lite style i think.
Kapanen is Draisaitl-dependent. His entire career is that of being an enigmatic inconsistent talented player. Only Draisaitl’s menacing glare brings out the best in him.
Oh it’s been noticed. At best, Kaspanen has been a non-factor recently. He needs some time in the press box to refocus his efforts.
RNH’s play is worrying.
This is Kapanen’s history, right? When he stops committing to skating hard, being aggressive and winning battles, shift after shift, he becomes a bad 2-way player and doesn’t contirube much.
Of course, as we saw when he was inserted in to the playoffs last season, when he does the above listed things, and I think we can reasonably presume he will starting next week, he can be an impactful player, positively.
Getting Drai and Hyman back in to the lineup helps slot players better and provides more talent/skill in the bottom six which helps.
I think people are sleeping on how precarious the Oilers position is. We’re likely to go 1-1 fair? Avs will want their statement game for MacKinnon to earn the Hart. 92 points
Knights get the basically eliminated Jets and the Kraken. 95 points
Kings get the Canucks, Kraken and Flames. 3-0 likely. Fair? 93 points.
Ducks get the Canucks, the Wild who have nothing to play for and the Preds who may be eliminated by the last game. Call it 2-1? 93 points.
People are excited because we made the playoffs but that was never my goal. We play the Avs the season is over.
Personally I’m hoping for a first round series with the Ducks with home ice advantage. I don’t have any doubts for this team in a 7 game series within the ‘Pillow Fight’ Pacific. Avoiding the Mammoth isn’t a terrible consolation prize by missing out on the division title.
If the Oilers can’t finish top three, the Oilers deserve the Avalanche. That’s justice.
Agreed LT. As my old man used to say, “you get what you pay for”.
You can bet the Avs wouldn’t be super thrilled with that turn of events either.
Agree completely. This is a pretty bad team; 18th overall behind the likes of the Islanders and Wings. Certainly the worst Oiler team in ages. In any other year I’d say get on with the offseason, get the surgeries, get Cassidy and back to the gym.
But it just so happens it’s BY FAR the easiest path they’ve ever had. Their highest ranked foe in the first two rounds is ALSO behind the Islanders. Such a shame to waste it.
These Oilers make nothing easy. Why not, take on the Avs. They did beat what I think was a better Red Wings team in 2006 (compared to this year’s Avs) IMO. Should be fun anyways and that’s the name of the game, especially if they have a healthy and motivated 29 and Hyman. Do you think they can convince Pronger to leave the TV gig and lace them up again 🙂
The Oilers are the most ridiculous ceiling to floor team I’ve ever seen among true contenders. The top of the roster should already have a SC ring, the bottom of the roster is expansion quality. People keep blaming the goalie, but if the Oilers played defense the way we’ve seen since the Florida games, wins would come more often.
Telling people that they were seeing things when Stu’s numbers have him literally the 2nd worst goalie in the playoffs in the last four years is beyond gaslighting LT.
Let it go.
Skinner was money against the Stars, the whole team was awful against the Panthers. Carry on.
Didn’t he lose the net for Calvin in the regular season in March/April last year?
Didn’t he lose the net against the Kings and only got it back because Calvin got hurt?
Doesn’t the biggest sample size say he is the 2nd worst playoff goalie in the last four season?
Stan may have bought a lemon but that’s a different argument than suggesting Stun isn’t the 2nd worst playoff goalie in the last several years.
When the Oilers forget to defend for the first two games of the series and the coach is forced to wake them up by swapping the goalies – that is not Skinners fault.
Since you are “remembering” I will assume you also remember that the high danger chances the Oil gave the Kings in the first two games were less than the number they gave them for the rest of that series . . . . unless that is also “Skinners fault”
Man, try to do dumb better.
Agree with this, 100% and lets not forget that Pickard was every bit as bad in game 3 as Skinner was in the 1st two games and gave up a 100% egregious goal at the worse time after the Oilers had come back.
Full credit to Pickard for the run and getting the wins but he was not outstanding or even very good – he was “meh” at best doing just enough to allow the Oilers offence win games – lots of bad goals. IIRC there was never single game where Picks was a major reason for a victory.
Skinner lost the net in March/April last year when his head was introduced to Rantanen’s knee.
i believe you are looking at nearly worst case scenario. The kings, while “heavily favoured with a laughably easy” last three games, still are a team that has gone to OT 32 times this year 32! I dont think 6 points is likely. Possible of course, but i think 4-5 points is more of a reasonable expectation.
i think whats more likely is that its gon be kings oilers again. Yay.
If we’re being honest it will likely be over the second they hit one of MIN-DAL-COL, barring any injury luck. VGK is a goaltender streak from dominating as well. A lot of things could go right for Edmonton, but it would really hinge on starting in the Pacific.
The Oilers are a goaltending streak away from dominating as well, no?
All the information in this post is true but, at the same time, I don’t see all the teams listed gaining max points. Looks like 3 easy games for the Kings, sure, but they are all on the road and a sweep is far from guaranteed.
Oilers could beat the Avs just as easily as the Ducks beating the Wild.
Of course, would like to stay out of WC2 (and I think they will) but, if they have to play the Avs, well, they are banged up right now as well – Avs would be a heavy favourite, Oilers have pulled many upsets over the years, historically and recently.
I agree OP. The Oilers can upset the so called more powerful teams. Historically and recent evidence proves that. Fear is deflating and dampens belief. And if they do it in the first round, imagine the confidence they’d carry into the second round and beyond. It will challenge the players and coaching staff and could sharpen the focus
Tough play by/on Bouch – he is exceptional at keeping the puck in the O zone, so the odd muff will happen.
My goodness that was a) a dull game – I can’t imagine going regularly to watch that brand of hockey, and b) a horrible game by the zebras both ways. Crappy NHL reffing standard ready in time for playoffs ✔️. Please let them play someone other than LA this year.
No problem they’ll beat the Avalanche in round one.