Edmonton Oilers Fall 4-1 to Blues in Cammalleri’s Debut

Coming off an outstanding 8-2 victory over the Vegas Golden Knights Tuesday, the Edmonton Oilers were hoping to carry over their success into Thursday’s game against the Blues. However, the offence couldn’t muster up much, and Edmonton fell 4-1.

Ryan Strome notched the lone goal for the Oilers on a nice wrist shot on the power play. Matt Benning and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins picked up assists on Strome’s third goal of the season. Despite the Oilers getting some production out of their power play, it wasn’t enough, and they couldn’t catch up with St. Louis’ offence.

Edmonton Oilers

The Blues outshot the Oilers 39-30 and limited a lot of the Oilers’ chances. The top-six wasn’t able to muster up many scoring chances, and the first line didn’t seem to have a lot of energy or momentum.

With this, the offence is still struggling to score, and the Oilers need more production from all of their units. That was perhaps the biggest takeaway from Thursday, and it may result in the Oilers splitting their top-line duo of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl just so they can create more scoring lines and add depth.

The Oilers also need to stay out of the penalty box, which took away from a lot of their time in the offensive zone. And though the penalty kill was 75 percent successful, St. Louis was given too many chances and eventually capitalized and gathered a lot of momentum.

Michael Cammalleri also made his Oilers debut and recorded two shots and four hits in 15:30 minutes TOI. He added a lot to the bottom-six and made himself physical and involved each shift. While he didn’t score, he did add a lot of speed and energy and helped create a number of scoring chances.

McDavid and Jesse Puljujarvi led the forward lines with three shots on goal each, and on defence, Darnell NUrse led the charge with four shots. Oscar Klefbom led all skaters with over 23 minutes TOI.

Next: Edmonton Oilers: Cammalleri Trade a Smart Bet

Edmonton will head to Dallas Saturday to take on the Stars and will look to rebound and get more out of their offence, while also working to rebound and get back in the early Pacific Division race. It may still seem early, however, it is important for Edmonton to get these points now that may make a huge difference later.