Hey apologies for a few absent days once again. You can blame my fiancée as I just got engaged these past couple days. I'm sure no one wants to hear about my love life so instead let's move onto the hockey talk.
The Oilers continue to be mired in mediocrity, losing in OT to the two last place teams in the Metro Division in the Devils and Islanders. We can talk about how the goaltending let them down in both games but right now blame should fall directly on the shoulders of Dave Tippett. Tippett just doesn't seem to have the ability to bring anything else new out of this team, he refuses to elevate younger players while relying on veterans that clearly cannot handle the responsibilities he continues to spoon feed them.
Take the game against the Islanders for example. Ryan Nugent Hopkins was out of the lineup for that game leaving a hole in the top six on the left side. Instead of elevating Warren Foegele, Ryan McLeod, or even Tyler Benson who has slowly started to play very well, Tippett elects to put Devin Shore in that position.Not only did Shore play in the top six, he ended up playing more minutes than Zach Hyman or Jesse Puljujarvi. In his elevated role, Shore posted 0 shots, 0 hits, 0 takeaways, but he blocked 1 shot so I guess that makes Tippett a genius.
The fact that this team is currently fighting to just make it into the playoffs is an absolute embarrassment. With McDavid and Draisaitl in the middle of their prime this is still a team that is struggling to keep their head above water. Because of the moves that Ken Holland made there is no cap space left to try and address the roster issues but even if there was I don't see any single move being enough to turn this team around.
Oiler fans are looking west at the Canucks who after being near the bottom of the league through their first two months of the season made the decision to fire Travis Green and bring in Bruce Boudreau who proceeded to help the team go on to a 7 game win streak and now find themselves right up to the Oilers in the standings.
Yet despite all of this you have members of the media such as Bob Stauffer and Mark Spector telling fans that they are wrong to want a coaching change and that they instead need consistency behind the bench. They herald Tippett as a long tenured coach but being around for a long time is not always a positive. Just look at milk. Obviously I want to see the Oilers succeed but I also do believe for the long term success of this team it is almost better for the team to continue to flounder so that new blood can be brought behind the bench. That being said I have little faith in this organization to bring in new blood and instead we would likely get Mike Babcock; because Oilers.
Tonight Edmonton is going to face off against a Rangers team that just played the night before and Panarin is out on COVID Protocol. That should make things a bit easier for this team when they once again allow the first goal and need to claw their way back into the game.