Well that was terrible. I mean, from every conceivable angle that was a terrible experience. To start with, I’m not a Minecraft fan. That means the blocky pixelated hockey I was watching made my eyes hurt. It felt like I was watching an A-Channel highlight clip. Maybe I was just a grump last night but to have the game start off with that feed only made me ready to spew venom at the actual play of the team.
Once the Hawks got into the game the Oilers basically conceded it to them. If we’re drawing any positive at all it’s that the team started well, but then that just leads into the question of why did it all come off the rails. The answer, it seems, starts on the back end. Andrew Ference blocked a shot and was taken out of the game to get an x-ray done. The tests came back negative, but the team was forced to go with 5 Defensemen, 3 of whom are certainly AHL bound.
The simple fact is that the Hawks were down to 29 bodies in Camp, so while they did choose to rest their big guns, they are just a handful of players away from their actual NHL club. The Oilers, meanwhile, are still 20ish players away from their real club. It is happening because the preseason was set up for the Oilers with 2 back to back sets. Whoever had a hand in making the schedule did Edmonton no favours.
The decision to keep the players rested resulted directly in a complete trouncing by the Hawks and ultimately I question the value of the game at all, more so for the defense. There was no defensive pairing that the Oilers will use in the regular season playing in the game. No chemistry or familiarity being formed that will help the club when the puck drops for real. This is the reminder that Training Camp is not the place to sort your prospects, it’s the place to get your NHL team in order.
With that in mind, the Oilers don’t have a lot of time to get their NHL club sorted and based on yesterday, they need to focus on that. I recognize that nobody wants to play in back to backs, but getting the team ready to play is the goal here. The coaches need to be spending time with their players, not Todd Nelson’s AHL players.
The Blackhawks have that much figured out, it’s time to get this thing going.
One last quick observation from last night’s game. Jordan Eberle was completely invisible. He did nothing out there in front of his home crowd. It’s worrisome. A lot of people are quick to criticize Yakupov, but he was a danger to score at least a couple times. Eberle was never once in a position to convert on a high quality chance.
LINEUP
The home crowd is going to get to see a much better squad than the people of Saskatoon got yesterday. Petry practiced today but isn’t likely to get into game action yet. Fasth will get the start and the athletic goalie should be doing his best to push for the conversation of starter, even though Scrivens is the incumbent. Yesterday we saw an inexperienced Defense get chewed up, tonight could be more of the same without some inspire performances.
Hall RNH Pitlick Tkachev Yakimov Westgarth Pouliot Acton Miller Moroz Ewanyk Pinizzotto
Nikitin Fayne Nurse Hunt Aulie Musil
Fasth
OILERS KEYS TO THE GAME
1) Are You For Real? The less and less that the other Centers do, the more and more Bogdan Yakimov stands out. It’s starting to get to the point where one could say that he looks like the Oilers’ 3rd best C right now. I’m not even close to saying he SHOULD start in the NHL this year, but if he keeps it up…
UPDATE
This was asked of Eakins after I wrote this.
"We won't hesitate at all. We want to go with guys who earned the spots." Eakins on if they would go with Draisaitl and Yakimov. #Oilers
— Jason Gregor (@JasonGregor) September 29, 20142) Pitlick Pushed. This is a big feature game for Pitlick, who will be lining up beside RNH and Hall. The Oilers really want Pitlick to assert himself at this camp and he hasn’t done it with enough authority yet. He has looked pretty good, but tonight will be the big opportunity. We should notice him out there. He plays a physical game and he has the wheels to keep up with Hall and Nuge. If he can outplay Joensuu for the 4RW spot then he’ll stick with the big club.
3) Faytitin. The Nikitin/Fayne pairing represents the commitment the Oilers made to adding NHL bodies to the back end. They are backed up by 4 non-NHL players tonight, but the duo should be firmly in the Oilers’ top 4. We’re hopeful to perhaps see some offense from Nikitin and get a good look at what, exactly, Fayne does out there. The club poured a significant amount of money, some argue too much, into this pairing. What kind of play will a little over 8M combined get you?
Puck drops tonight at 7PM Mountain Time on the Oilers’ Website. Game on!
UPDATE
The Oilers cut Curtis Hamilton, Kessy, Pakarinen, Williams, and Gernat. All are assigned to the Barons, who now have enough players to practice line changes.
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