3 Takeaways from impressive Oilers 4-1 win in Kris Knoblauch debut
A breakdown of Kris Knoblauch’s strong debut, as the Oilers beat the Islanders 4-1 and have their first winning streak of the 2023-24 season.
If nothing else, you can call the start to this season eventful for the Edmonton Oilers. There never really seems to be a dull moment, when it comes to this team.
Along these lines, Monday night’s game versus the Islanders doubled as the coaching debut for Kris Knoblauch. While he did briefly coach the Rangers during COVID-19 due to health-related absences, this represents his first official NHL tenure as the main man behind the bench.
It helped that the Oilers were facing a struggling Islanders team, who they always seem to do well against at home. Regardless, a night which started with nervous anticipation, ended with a hard-earned 4-1 win.
Whether this represents the beginning of a new dawn for an underachieving team remains to be seen, but for one game at least, Oilers fans can rejoice. Let’s get to our three takeaways from a much-needed win:
1) A game of firsts
With Knoblauch making his debut as coach for the Oilers, it made sense that this would be a night of firsts for the team. This included the team winning for the first time this season at Rogers Place.
The 4-1 victory over the Islanders also represented the first winning streak of the 2023-24 campaign for the Oilers. However, arguably most important of all, this was also the first win for their new coach.
There are those who quite rightly believe the Oilers were too hasty in getting rid of Jay Woodcroft, no matter how poorly the team had been playing. However, for one game at least, the decision was proven to be the right one.
For a start, Zach Hyman talked about the calming presence of Knoblauch, which is an invaluable trait to have in the face of a team not performing up to expectation and just adversity in general. What was just as important, were some of the changes on the ice.
There had been a lot of talk about Woodcroft relying on his top two lines too much, increasingly so as he desperately looked for ways to get the team back on the winning track. The balance was more noticeable against the Islanders in terms of ice time for everyone, with only three of the 12 forwards seeing less than 10 minutes of action.
Knoblauch was understandably happy with the win, which was made even better by what the Oilers did for him after the game in the dressing room. Speaking to the media, he said:
“After the game, they did something really special. They had a video on the TV, they presented the puck and they had my wife on the TV just saying a few words, and that was very nice of them to do.”
There’s obviously still a lot of pressure on the 45-year-old to get the Oilers to perform up to expectations, and for him to stop the coaching carousel in Edmonton. For the first game at least though, he’s off to a great start.
2) The return of the superstars and the power play
There were many reasons why the Oilers had started the season so poorly, with a 3-9-1 record. At the heart of this, was the form — or lack thereof — from their resident superstars, Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl.
McDavid had equalled his career-worst goal drought of eight games, while Draisaitl had just one in his previous 10 contests. Even allowing for lingering or unconfirmed/suspected injuries, this was just not what was expected from the duo.
The two forwards couldn’t have picked a better game to break out of their respective slumps. Whether it was because of the impact of Knoblauch, playing a poor Islanders team or something else, they looked more like their usual selves on Monday night.
Draisaitl got the party started, as he tied up the game in the first period in impressive fashion. He took a pass from Darnell Nurse, turned Sebastian Aho inside out and powered down the right wing before finishing strong low left with the snapshot.
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Draisaitl and McDavid then combined in the third period, to put Zach Hyman in position to give the Oilers their first lead of the night with his team-leading eighth goal of the season. Importantly it also came on the power play, which had not been up to its usual standard of late for the team.
Within less than two minutes the Oilers broke through again on the power play, this time seeing McDavid end his goal drought. Draisaitl set up him with a beautiful pass and even though there was some good fortune on the finish, you’ll take a goal any way you can when you’ve been struggling to put the puck away.
Draisaitl put a cap on the star duos’ performance, by feeding Evander Kane for an empty net goal to complete the scoring for the Oilers. Speaking to the media after the game about coming through with the man advantage, McDavid said:
“Our power play always says it is not about how many you get, it is about the ones you do get and the time you get them. Those two in a big moment for our group, it was good.”
3) Stuart Skinner looking better between the pipes
The game couldn’t have started much worse for the team, when the Islanders took a 1-0 lead inside one minute. It didn’t matter that it wasn’t Stuart Skinner’s fault, or that he couldn’t do much about the goal.
However, any fears that the early score would open the floodgates for the visitors, never came to fruition. Instead, Skinner responded with arguably his best game of the season to date.
The 25-year-old made a scrappy but important stop when the game was tied at 1-1 in the first period. He also came up with a couple of key saves in the final 20 minutes, when the game was still up for grabs.
Skinner — helped by an excellent defensive effort — held the Islanders scoreless on the power play, as the visitors went 0-for-3. Overall, he finished the game with a season-high 32 saves, from 33 shots on goal.
After looking shaky early in 2023-24 — albeit not all of his own doing — the Edmonton native has been excellent in his last two starts. It is no coincidence this has coincided with the Oilers’ first winning streak of the campaign.
We won’t go as far as saying Skinner is back to the form which saw him finish runner up for the Calder Memorial Trophy. However, the signs are certainly promising.
The goaltender’s teammates were full of praise for his performance on the night, with McDavid noting he was there when they needed him. Speaking to the media postgame, Hyman added:
“I think Stu played great. That’s first and foremost. When you have a guy playing like that and backing you up it gives you a chance, so that was awesome.”
Quote of the day
McDavid was asked about the emotions of dealing with the change of the coaching staff over the weekend. He said:
“It’s been a crazy couple days obviously, it’s been a crazy 48 hours. It’s unfortunately something we have gone through before and we responded the same way. It was everything that we have kind of been missing.”
Next. Connor McDavid-bashing is ridiculous. dark
Overall, we appreciate it’s only one win; the team is still just 4-9-1 and sitting six points out of the final playoff spot in the Western Conference. However, you have to start somewhere and never has it been more a case of taking it just one game at a time, with the Oilers next playing on Wednesday night when they host the Seattle Kraken.