Jim Matheson, Special to the Sun
While Edmonton Oilers coach Jay Woodcroft says he was happy to get a point Saturday in the 3-2 overtime loss to Colorado, they did so only because Stuart Skinner was terrific in net in his coming-out party and their power play had 11 shots on Alexandar Georgiev and both goals by Zach Hyman.
But let’s face it, the Oilers got caved five-on-five. They barely had the puck even-strength in the first 40 minutes (shots were 21-7 for Colorado) and barely kept the puck away from the Avs until Woodcroft went nuclear in the third and reunited Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl with Hyman on the other wing.
True, the Oilers got a point and are in a Western Conference wild-card position (second, behind Calgary), but on a night when they managed only one point at home, they lost ground to Seattle and Los Angeles, who each got two.
The Kraken, which has 18 goals in its past three wins is up on the Oilers by three points (48-45) with three games in hand. The Kings, who host the Oilers on Monday night, are seven points ahead of Edmonton (52-45) but have played two more games.
The Oilers are at the 41-game, halfway mark of the schedule and they’ve won 21 and lost 20 if you count OT and shootout loser points after dropping their past three to Seattle, Nashville and Colorado.
You don’t need me to say that is not good, folks.
The only plus in all of this: The Oilers, who next play in L.A., San Jose, Anaheim and Vegas, are way better (11-6-1) on the road than at home (10-11-1). They are the only team in a playoff position today in the Western Conference with a losing record at home.
“In the long run it’s an important point for us,” Woodcroft said. “Our team did some good things, but they (the Avs) are the Stanley Cup champions. Our special teams were very good (2-for-5 on the power play, 4-for-4 killing penalties). We hit the crossbar twice (Brett Kulak and Hyman) in overtime. Special players on both teams made special plays tonight.”
Here are some takeaways from Saturday’s loss:
- When the teams were even-strength, the Oilers got crushed. Over the 62 minutes, the Avs had 36 ES shots, the Oilers 17, and didn’t give Georgiev any tough saves to make until the third period. The Avs, while playing without Gabe Landeskog and Valeri Nichushkin up front, were still a major headache, especially Nate MacKinnon, Evan Rodrigues and Artturi Lehkonen (18 shots between them). The Oilers’ line of Draisaitl, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Hyman played almost 11 minutes even-strength and was outshot 11-1, a rarity.
“I would have liked better (five-on-five as a whole),” said Woodcroft. “It was a battle in the neutral zone and who was willing to get pucks in behind the other team’s defence … we didn’t get enough to put them under any kind of duress early, but it got better as it went on.”
2. Skinner, who had a rare pedestrian night in a loss to Seattle where he was pulled after giving up four goals on 20 shots, got them the point against the Avs in his first-ever game against the Cup champs.
It was the seventh time Skinner has faced at least 42 shots this season, with four wins and 3 losses. He stopped 10 of 11 MacKinnon shots with the only one beating him coming on a warp-speed rush through Cody Ceci and Darnell Nurse and a flip under the bar on a break-in.
Skinner was, as they say, “tracking the puck well.” You could see that early when MacKinnon tried to beat him with his patented short-side high shot, on the power play, and Skinner, who should be getting way more rookie-of-the-year love than he does, coolly got his arm in the way and batted it aside.
“You know Davo (McDavid) does it on me in practice for the past years I’ve been here,” Skinner said. “I actually read it pretty well, but he made a nice shot and I was just a half-second too slow on it.”
3. This blown 2-0 lead had a different feel to it than the ones to Anaheim, Vancouver and Seattle because 5-on-5 the Oilers were getting manhandled by Colorado, even ahead by two. You have to admire the Avs. They refused to go away, basically going with three defencemen late in Cale Makar, Devon Toews and Sam Girard.
“If you look around the league, no lead is safe,” Woodcroft said. “I think, as I’ve said, we lead the league I comebacks. Would I have liked to secure it? Yeah, we would. We gave up a goal (4-on-4 to Brad Hunt) on the cycle that we would like back.”
4. The Oilers’ D pair of Nurse and Ceci were matched continually against MacKinnon’s line, no easy task, and certainly had issues, although they didn’t get a whole lot of help out of their forwards and were outshot 20-7 as a pair.
On MacKinnon’s great goal, he simply had too much gas in the tank as he roared up the ice after Klim Kostin gave up the puck a long way from the Oilers net.
It’s the kind of play McDavid makes all the time and we applaud No. 97’s virtuosity.
Maybe we should do the same for MacKinnon.
“He gets the puck in a spot where he’s turning into it, and then he gets galloping there,” said Oilers’ defenceman, and former MacKinnon teammate, Tyson Barrie. “Tough to stop him when he has that much speed.”
5. Hyman’s career high is 27 goals. He has 20 already. The winger scored on two of his nine shots that Georgiev had to handle Saturday and another six were either blocked or went wide — so, 15 times he was in and around the net, hitting the crossbar in OT, too. The nine on net was his second most this season. He had 10 on Long Island in November.
Hyman has 157 shots (20 goals) in the 40 games he’s played. That’s only one fewer than McDavid. His 11 PP goals are also fifth in the NHL, tied with David Pastrnak and Kirill Kaprizov, with McDavid, Draisaitl and Tage Thompson (14) and Mika Zibanejad (12) ahead of him.
“I had a lot of chances. Would have been nice to bear down on one them and get the win there,” said Hyman.
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