Last night’s game between the Flames and Oilers was one of robberies.
Whether it was Markstrom making a huge save after a pace-disrupting three to four minutes between shots against, Noah Hanifin or the rest of the defence corp making a desperate play to shut down Draisatl or McDavid, or even the freaky sequence involving the puck bouncing off referee Dan O’Rourke’s skate to rob Markstrom of the shutout— the theme of the night seemed to be the immediate inspiration of hope followed by the sudden dashing of said hope via a quick stroke.
The Flames certainly deserve credit.
Keeping the league’s 4th best power play 0/4 on the night is a primary reason the Flames woke up this morning two points higher in the standings.* Markstrom posted a .964 save percentage— again only robbed of his ninth shutout due to a freak bounce.
Draisatl logged an absurd 24:00 and only registered a single shot.
The Calgary Flames checked like they needed to and most would agree that putting a stop to the offensive Oilers juggernaut of Draisatl and McDavid resulted in moving up to 75 points in the standings Monday night. Some timely goals from Toffoli and Gaudreau and some choice giveaways by Oilers defenseman Darnell Nurse certainly helped too.
Let’s be real though.
The Oilers don’t look themselves. Let’s take a look at a few key reasons our provincial brethren aren’t reaching their potential.
#1: The Nuge In the last three years, when the Oilers start losing more games than they win, the common denominator is almost always Ryan Nugent Hopkins being out of the lineup or Ryan Nugent Hopkins playing injured.
It seems like an oversimplification to put the fate of a team with two of the best players in the world down to one player that isn’t said two players, but his absence is undeniable.
Hopkins gets injured, the Oilers lose 10/12, fans call for the coach’s head.
Nuge comes back, the Oilers go on a six game heater, fanbase is appeased.
Nuge goes out again, another sub .400 streak, Tippett out, Woodcroft hired.
Nuge is healthy, hot streak for Woodcroft’s first seven games, Nuge gets injured, bad again.
It must be maddening to have to listen to fellow fans calling for this or that, but at the end of the day; Nugent Hopkins is in his tenth season of being rode hard and put away wet. His wrist, which he has had surgically repaired, isn’t always 100% and he’s had shoulder issues as well.
The Edmonton Oilers need to plan around his injuries or they are doomed to less and less success as his issues get worse with age and wear.
#2: McDavid isn’t 100% either You can call this speculation, but anyone watching the Oilers in the last few months (or even just last night) can see that McDavid isn’t breaking the game with his unprecedented acceleration like he normally does.
Critics claiming his speed is the primary reason that he is considered the best in the world (at least offensively) can take a look at the the league’s top scorers in a season when McDavid hasn’t been blowing past players on a nightly basis.
Around the All Star Game there were rumblings that the problem was one of his knees. Connor had suffered a completely torn PCL, tears to both his medial and lateral menisci, a completely torn popliteus muscle, and tibial plateau fracture after a freak accident in the final game of the 18-19 season. He went the route of non-invasive rehabilitation and looked like he recovered fully, but perhaps issues have surfaced.
That’s just speculation, but we can all agree that Connor doesn’t look 100%.
#3: The rest of the squad has injury issues too Here is a chart comparing man games lost to placement in the standings. Left to right is man games lost. Top to bottom is total points.
Edmonton ranks fifth last. The four teams below them are well out of the playoffs. Not rocket science here. Note Calgary as the healthiest team in the NHL this season. 39 man games lost to injury for those wondering.
Fun question for you though. Does this chart look different if Edmonton has a legitimate nuclear option in terms of an enforcer?
#4: Goalie chaos Mike Smith has a tendency to still get the majority of starts provided he is even 60% healthy. Flames fans will remember him playing through a bevy of groin issues. Whether he should or shouldn’t be insisting on starting is debatable, but he’s been in division for as long as Ryan Nugent Hopkins has been on the Oilers. It should be no secret by now that Mike Smith is either an elite goalie or playing injured. This season has been almost exclusively the latter.
Koskinen has done better, but he’s far from elite. His 4.5 annual average value contract has been a burden, but it ends this year.
If you ask any Oilers fan, the third string Stuart Skinner should be getting far more starts. He doesn’t for whatever internally-decided reasons.
With 6.5 million tied up in two goalies that aren’t considered starters anymore, the Oilers also certainly have a problem in goal.
#5: A less than ideal blue line Going into the season the Oilers blue line looked like this:
Nurse-Barrie Keith-Ceci Russel-Lagesson/Bouchard
With injuries, it looks like this:
Nurse-Ceci Keith-Broberg Niemelà¤inen-Lagesson
Most would argue that neither looks like the blue line of a contender. It’s current format is worse than most teams in the 11th-16th range of the standings.
For the sake of brevity, we’re not getting into why Cody Ceci shouldn’t be on the first pairing. The two were outchanced to the tune of a 44.12 CF% last game. Three giveaways for Nurse. That pairing isn’t strong enough to be first on a depth chart.
So.
What would you do if you were the GM?
The defence is overpaid, the goalie situation is a mess and overpaid, and the forwards are an unhealthy mess too.
In non-replacement level contracts on the team, the Oilers clear 8.258 million between Koskinen, Turris, and Kane in the offseason. Everyone else is signed into next year. Add a whopping 8.9 million dollars in space if Keith retires due to cap circumvention rules outlined in the current CBA. The Blackhawks would be on the books for his cap hit if he were to retire.
One suggestion would be to liquidate younger assets in an attempt to upgrade the team. Broberg, Bouchard, Holloway, Yamamoto, Bourgeault, their first round pick this season are all available.
Given Draisatl has three more seasons on his current contract and McDavid has four; maybe a move sooner than later would be the best for all parties involved.
You can’t do much about the injuries until the player goes on LTIR. Given they need to be under the cap to start the season and most players are healthy at that point, so a play for a top four defenseman may be the best route. With Arizona’s Jakob Chychrun on the market and Hampus Lindholm of Anaheim possibly also on the market; options are there.
Two potential trades
This first trade centres around top pairing right handed defenseman, Jakob Chychrun. He handles the hard defensive assignments for the Arizona Coyotes and has proven he can run a first unit power play in the last three seasons. While he got bumped out of that spot due to Shayne Gostisbehere this campaign, he scored 12 and 18 goals the two seasons prior.
2022 1st round pick (EDM) 2023 3rd round pick (EDM) F Xavier Bourgeault D Marcus Niemelà¤inen
For
D Jakob Chychrun
The Coyotes get a pile of futures to with their already vast amount of picks in the next two years. Niemelà¤inen, who has been steadily establishing himself as a regular, would fill the criteria of “roster player… in the trade.
Or
This one depends on Keith deciding he will hang them up. Certainly possible given the head injuries he’s sustained this season. Hampus Lindholm has been quintessential to the success of the Anaheim Ducks since entering the league in 2013-14. His long reach, above average acceleration and respectable size (6’2…, 210lbs) are exactly the tools what one looks for in a #1 defenseman.
2022 1st round pick (EDM) 2023 2nd round pick (EDM) F Dylan Holloway
For
D Hampus Lindholm
Lindholm gives assurances that he’s ready to pen an 8x8 long term contract and suddenly the Oilers top 4 looks adequate. Not cheap, but the Ducks don’t need to trade Lindholm, and top pairing defensemen don’t grow on trees.
What moves would you make?
Apologies for the longer piece. On to tonight’s game.
The 34-14-7 Calgary Flames finish out a back-to-back tonight against the hot-and-cold 30-18-9 Washington Capitals.
Looking at the Capitals’ last ten games, there are some questionable results.
A 4-0 shutout of the Hurricanes: good. A 2-1 loss the Flyers: bad. A 5-4 loss to the Blue Jackets: bad. A 5-4 win over the new-look Canadiens: good.
The team’s quality of play seems to be all over the place.
Tonight they kick off a three game Western Canada road trip and an Alberta back-to-back with a game against the 34-14-7 Calgary Flames.
While Calgary’s 8-1-1 record vs. The Capitals’ 5-5-0 record seems daunting for the away team, the Flames will be playing their fourth game in six days and their second game in two nights.
The Capitals, meanwhile, have had two and a half days of rest following their 5-2 victory of the Kraken at the Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle.
Lines updated at warmups. Vladar took the starter’s net in morning skate. Richardson, Stone and Ritchie were the only other attendees, so expect last night’s lines to remain the same.
Gaudreau-Lindholm-Tkachuk Coleman-Backlund-Toffoli Mangiapane-Ruzicka-Dube Lucic-Monahan-Lewis
Hanifin-Andersson Kylington-Tanev Zadorov-Gudbranson
Vladar
Trials of sweat and blood Tonight, may not go smoothly for the Flames— and the gauntlet of games doesn’t end after tonight. They play three games in five days after this game including a back-to-back over the weekend.
Next week features another three games in four days including another back-to-back, but at least there is a two day break thrown in there early in the week.
Expect Ritchie and Richardson to be swapped in and out of the lineup. Expect to see Vladar more. Expect injuries. You just can’t play this much hockey without wear-and-tear becoming a factor. Expect things you haven’t seen this season like more than one Stockton regular drawing in.
Backup showdown Daniel Vladar and Vitek Vanacek get the start tonight. It’s clear Washington Head Coach Peter Laviolette wants a a better shot at a guaranteed two points out if their own back-to-back. Their starter, Ilya Samsonov, starts tomorrow against Edmonton.
Milestones Mikael Backlund plays his 800th game as a Flame tonight. He sits fifth in games played among Calgary Flames. In order of most played: Iginla, Giordano, Regehr, and MacInnis are ahead of him.
Alex Ovechkin only needs two goals to tie Jaromir Jagr at 766 on the all-time goals list. He has a goal in each of his last two games.
Puck drop around 7:09pm mst.
Trevor Neufeld
Statistics and graphic courtesy of naturalstattrick.com, NHL.com, and @ManGamesLostNHL on Twitter.
Follow me on Twitter @Trevor_Neufeld
*To be fair, lately the Oilers powerplay has been closer to a middle-of-the-pack in terms of percentage. Over the past two months they’ve dropped from first to fourth.