Game 82 is finally here. We made it.
One day this will be just be the end of one season and the beginning of another, but for now it marks the 9th year in row that the Oilers will finish outside of the playoffs. And so the team will finish up tonight and, victorious or not, tomorrow they will come back to Rexall and clean out their stalls.
9 years out of the playoffs and actively "rebuilding" since the Winter of 2009. It's hard to imagine a team getting more patience from the fans but I sense that patience is coming to an end. It's difficult to accept more losing when even the Flames are making the Playoffs.
Calgary drafted one spot behind the Oilers last year and one spot ahead the year before that. This team was predicted to lose many games at the beginning of the season and the fancy stats have not been kind to them but they found ways to win. Fair or not, that makes accepting another brutal season that much more difficult.
I'm entirely over trying to find moral victories from November to April because nobody in the organization could find enough Centers or Goaltenders to field a proper team 6 years into rebuilding. As many have noticed I am becoming increasingly pessimistic towards this management team. That's probably an understatement. How am I or anybody else supposed to believe the Oilers are in good hands when the team is unquestionably worse today than when this group took over?
The Oilers announced a long time ago there was going to be a forensic audit that would leave no stone unturned. I have seen no proof such a thing has actually occurred and until the team goes public with its findings or changes the way it does business I will assume it was simply lip service to buy more time from the fans.
I will alway be a fan of this team, but I can't change the fact that I see significant problems with the way they operate. Despite themselves the Oilers still haven't killed the part of me that cheers when they score or pulls for individuals to overcome adversity.
Nothing can stop me from wanting Nail Yakupov, who according to Slava Malamud has indeed heard from the Russian National Team, to prove the doubters wrong and recover completely from the Eakins fiasco. Nothing can stop me from believing we are only scratching the surface of what Ryan Nugent-Hopkins can do in the NHL. Nothing.
We've been forced to watch a lot of unbearable hockey this year but the season of hope is just around the corner. If the Islanders can turn their season around (even without a superstar* by adding Boychuk, Leddy, and Halak then so can the Oil. If Calgary can go from drafting 4th to making the Playoffs then so can Edmonton.
Change is possible. All hope is not lost. The only thing that needs to happen is the team has to admit where they were wrong and correct it moving forward. The plan can't be to wait until the team just magically gets better when the new arena is ready. Fix this Defense. Fix the goaltending.
82 games. The club owes it to those of us who stuck with them through all of this to fix these problems with a real sense of urgency.
In any event, it has been a challenge but I had a lot of fun enduring this season with you guys. Writing about hockey, even for a team as infuriating as the Oilers, is still the most exciting part of my day.
* ;)
LINEUP
Viktor Fasth was reactivated off the IR which meant that it wasn't possible to keep Brossoit up any longer. Brossoit had earned this start tonight but the team had used up almost all of its real call ups at the deadline to make sure they could send back all the AHLers to the Barons for the Playoffs. Sometimes life isn't fair. Brossoit is the team's best prospect in net (for now) and it stands to reason we'll see him again next year at some point. For now there's a very good chance Fasth will play, making him the 4th Oiler Goaltender in as many games. I don't know if that's a team record but it should be.
Pouliot Hall Eberle Purcell Roy Yak Fraser Lander Pitlick Gazdic Klinkhammer Hamilton
Klefbom Schultz Marincin Musil Aulie Davidson
Fasth
OILERS KEYS TO THE GAME
1) Smarten Up. Since there are no healthy bodies even available there's no sense in saying that Justin Schultz should be a healthy scratch after what he did in the last game. I have all kinds of time for second chances, but the game was already hilariously one sided without him falling down and throwing the puck to the middle of the ice setting up the 1st goal against. It was the tying goal but it was also the back breaker. He owes his team a real performance tonight.
2) Break This Rusty Cage. It's possible Miller and Fasth play tonight which means neither goalie will have played in months. With Edmonton back to having Scrivens and Fasth as their tandem in net they are weaker than they've been in a long time. Fasth has a contract (with someone else) to play for so me needs this performance more than Miller does, but we could have said that about him all year and he's been horrible. 45 goaltenders have played at least 1000 minutes this year. Scrivens and Fasth are 44th and 45th in Even Strength save percentage.
3) Pride. Losing tonight means the Oilers will have set a new franchise record for the least amount of Wins. It almost seems impossible that the Oilers are still capable of setting records like that after spending so long trying to build this team up. I would have understood it in 2010, but not now. Play with some pride, especially after that performance against the Sharks where only the Yakupov line and Brossoit showed up.
Puck drops tonight at 8:10PM Mountain Time on CBC. Tank On!
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