Updated 12:10pm:
James Reimer and the Toronto Maple Leafs shut out the Edmonton Oilers 4-0 on Tuesday night. The Oilers are gawd awful right now. Their blue line is a turnstile. Their D cannot play tight-gap D and opponents are backing their D to their own blue ice.Their goal tending is a nightmare as well,. Dallas Eakins has already played 3 goalies this season and nine of them can steal games for the Oilers.
The Oilers are now 3-9-2 on the season. The players called a "players only meeting" after the Leafs loss.
Head coach Dallas Eakins is firmly on the hot seat right now. He apologized to the media for the delay of the opening of the players locker room after the long players meeting.
"I want to apologize to you guys. I know the room was closed for a couple of extra minutes there. The players were having a fireside chat. I hope you all can respect that."
Fire side chat? Were S'Mores served up?
Bottomline:
The Oilers's area of weaknesses: defense and goaltending.
So what did the team do today? It waived two D, Denis Grebeshkov and Corey Potter.
The Oilers need two NHL D and a goalie.
Were I Craig MacTavish, I'd be calling Darcy Regier today for a heart to heart about defense and goal tending help.
MacTavish might want to ask Regier for Ryan Miller, Jamie McBain and Brayden McNabb.
The Sabres would be wise to ask for Sam Gagner, a 1st rounder and a 2nd rounder.
MacTavish owes it to his owner, his head coach and his loyal fan base to call a timeout and clean up this oil spill before it gets worse.
Save your "Miller doesnt want to play in Canada" and your "Edmonton is one of Miller's eight teams that he does not want to play for".
I say poppycock on that.
If Im Regier, I craft a deal with MacTavish then I take it to Miller and I present it to him, not as a speculative trade but as a done deal. Then I would ask Miller to waive his no movement clause the same way that Robyn Regehr had done last spring in order to greenlight a trade to the LA Kings.
Miller may well just want to accept a trade now, and play for a team as a rental for the rest of this season.
Next summer several teams are going to be needing goaltending, including St Louis, Washington, Minnesota, and Colorado. Miller will then be able to sign with either one of those teams as a UFA.
The Blues may want to go all-in on Miller now. They need him to get past Jonathon Quick and their arch rivals the LA Kings. What would Darcy Regier want in return for Miller from St Louis? Ive heard the names Rattie and Oshie mentioned.
If Miller continues to play great for the remainder of this season and he ends up playing well for Team USA in the Olympics (he makes the team if selected today), he will be the top UFA available next summer. What will Darcy Regier be looking for in return for Miller? Ive heard the names Rattie and Oshie mentioned.
Time will tell where Miller will end up. For now there will continue to be speculation as to where he will land
The NHL salary cap will increase by six million dollars next year.
What does Edmonton have to lose right now?
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Whats going on in LA?
On Tuesday night, the Kings lost to the Phoenix Coyotes. The loss moves the Kings to 8-5 overall. Mr. Sutter's club is in 8th place in the West and there are questions about the team's offense. His top 6 forwards are slumping at the same time and its killing their ability to win games.
On Tuesday night, Sutter did what coaches do when they want to get the attention of his star players. He took away their ice time.
Jeff Carter skated a Kings career low of 13:05 TOI vs. Phoenix. Carter was -2 in the game. Fourth line winger Kyle Clifford played 13:04 TOI. Sutter wants more out of Carter and isn't getting it. Carter has 5 goals and 4 assists in 13 games, however, his shooting percentage is 9.1%.
The struggles don't end there. Sutter only play Mike Richards 12:16 TOI on Tuesday night. Richards was -2 as well. Richards has scored only 2 goals and added 6 assists in 13 games this season. His shooting percentage is 9.5%.
Anze Kopitar has only one goal on the season. He has 10 assists. Kopitar is struggling to score with his 2.6% shooting %.
Dustin Brown has only 2 goals and 3 assists in 13 games. He sports a 6.1% shooting percentage.
The Kings have scored 36 goals this season in 13 games, however, they have given up 33 goals against.
After the loss to the Coyotes, Sutter was asked by a reporter if the loss was a matter of Mike Smith being red hot, or, of his team was at fault.
"What, at the end of the night, was [the shot total]? Forty-something to something? So I’m going to assume that we had 15 really good opportunities. How many of them were from our top players? Probably three or four, and our top players got scored on and didn’t kill the penalty, and took the penalty with a couple minutes left in the second period. So usually that leads to a loss"
Sutter's ice time "beatings" will continue until morale and goal scoring changes.
Sutter isn't happy with his veteran forwards.
Can you tell?
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Compared to Matt Moulson's coming out party in Buffalo on Monday night, Thomas Vanek's home debut for the fans on Long Island was a rather inauspicious one.
In 19:48 TOI, the veteran sniper took just one shot on recently called up Rangers back-up tender Cam Talbot. Vanek landed two hits. Vanek played 3:43 on the PP and couldn't get his stick on pucks as he set up in his trademark net-front office.
After the game, Vanek said that he has to watch more tape to get a better understanding of his line mates John Tavares and Kyle Okposo. He also called out the officiating as being a "joke".
Thanks, Islanders TV
Moulson scored two goals for the Sabres in the 4-3 loss to Dallas.
My takeaway from Vanek's debut:
Shame on Tavares and Okposo for not getting Vanek the puck more. That wasn't Henrik Lundqvist in the Rangers net. Cam Talbot is an AHL goatender with little to no NHL experience. The Islanders should have known from advanced scouting that the Rangers are a team that cannot score goals. They also have had a ton of issues in their own end of the rink this season with turnovers, lost battles, and poor D-zone coverage. They should have also reading the scouting report that the Rangers goaltending has been adequate. Not great. Adequate. The Isanders could only get 24 shots on Talbot. Tavares and Cal Clutterbuck led the Isles with 3 shots each. Clutterbuck scored his first goal as an Islander in the game.
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