Red Wings 3, Oilers 1 – Don’t Panic.
The season is eleven games old, and I feel like I’m a pensioner looking through a bag of discarded scratch lottery tickets. I know the bag is full of u
seless tickets, but there’s going to be one that I pull out that’ll be worth a shiny, brand new toonie.
The Oilers played an unspectacular game by anyone’s standards on Friday night, but Detroit also played an unspectacular game by their standards. Detroit was less unspectacular and accrued two points for their efforts. Let us discuss this bevy of unspectacular after the jump, shall we?
Intangibles is what this game came down to. You’ve got the Edmonton Oilers – a youthful, pretty girl at the dance – against the Detroit Red Wings, the savvy experienced vixen with a penchant for heartbreak. It’s a Grand Prix and a GTO.
It wasn’t going to happen. Not this night.
After Abdelkader’s goal less than two minutes in, the Oilers tightened up long enough to see Taylor Hall pounce on a thick rebound. A sublime pass by Dan Cleary in front of Nikolai Khabibulin gave Valteri Filpulla an easy goal, and it was all that Detroit needed. One goal was all that Edmonton could muster.
Don’t panic. Yes, I said it. 1/8th of the season is gone, the Oilers are sitting at 3-6-2. Don’t panic. Not yet.
I realize that this year is scheduled to be another ‘rebuilding’ year, and there is plenty of substance on paper (and on the ice) that would suggest that the Oilers are headed down the same creek they came down last year. This squad is in no way the same team as last year’s hooligans, and if they can tighten up a few things, they’ll be a team that comes out on top a lot more than three times in eleven games. Here’s a few reasons not to be an angry young man:
- Anytime Detroit comes to town to square off against any of the recent incarnations of the Oilers, a blowout always looms. This didn’t happen. If Dan Cleary didn’t have the game of his season on Friday, there’s a legit shot the Oilers could’ve come out on top. Detroit and Edmonton were evenly matched throughout this game.
- The defence held it together this game quite nicely. Mind you, there are games that the defence gets outshot something like 44-6, but the Detroit game simply wasn’t that. Thirty shots allowed against a powerful Red Wing offence is nothing to shake a stick at. Edmonton managed thirty shots on offence. Game could’ve gone either way. We need to see more games where the defence isn’t a liability like this.
- Captain Obvious: Nikolai Khabibulin’s numbers – while currently not spectacular at 3-6-1 with a 3.31 GAA and a SV% of .900 will continue to improve if the penalty kill can come back to somewhere near the rest of the league (eg: a PK success rate of somewhere over 70%). It’s a daunting task for this year’s Oilers, but if the defence gets the glue out, we’ll all be pleasantly surprised. Devan Dubnyk faced 42 shots in his only start of this season and stopped 40 of them. This duo isn’t going to win the Jennings Trophy this year, this is true. But is asking for less than 3 goals allowed on ten PKs attempts really that much to ask?
- The kids are alright. Taylor Hall scored his third goal of the season last night (would 20-25 goals be a bad first outing? I didn’t think so either). Hall and Paajarvi have six points in 11 games, and we’ve already been spoiled by Jordan Eberle.
There are more, but you get the idea. No, they’re not perfect, and Yes, the defence folds sometimes. Why hasn’t Taylor Hall scored 593 goals yet? JIM VANDERMEER IS SUPPOSED TO WIN THE NORRIS, and so on.
It’s tough going out there. I understand. You’ve waited four winters to see a winner on the ice, and in today’s instant-do-it-yourself Internet age, that’s a lifetime.
Are the Oilers going to get better as the season progresses? I believe so.
Will they make the playoffs? I don’t do bold predictions on Sundays.
Oilers travel to face off against the Blackhawks tonight. Chicago is likely to have a pretty vivid memory of when Edmonton last visited and defeated the Blackhawks by a bushel.