In the standings, all losses seem the same: a capital L where a W should be.
Over the last four games, the Edmonton Oilers have found numerous ways to underachieve. However, Tuesday’s 5-3 setback against the Carolina Hurricanes may have had the greatest impact on the club thus far.
This will sting like a papercut.
Because, on a night when the Oilers outworked and outshot their opponent 51-21, they were let down by uncharacteristic errors from players on whom they have grown to rely the most.
“We have moments when we’re brain dead,” coach Todd McLellan admitted after the game. “It is clear that several of our go-to men are struggling right now.”
Captain Connor McDavid, one of those go-to guys, shared a similar view.
“You live and breathe with your best players,” said McDavid, who hasn’t scored since his season-opening hat trick against Calgary. “Those are the folks that need to get it done.”
With backup Laurent Brossoit making his season debut, the Oilers’ goaltending was subpar, while the top defense pairing struggled.
With four consecutive losses, fans who have grown increasingly dissatisfied will have more possibilities to question and protest.
“I’m certain there’ll be naysayers now.” McDavid said. “But we still believe in this room, obviously. It’s a little bit magnified, because it’s the first five games.”
For a team already under strain, the game began in the worst possible way.
With the Oilers attempting to forecheck in the Canes’ zone, defenseman Oscar Klefbom squeezed in and was caught, resulting in a two-on-one the opposite side. The first shot took just 20 seconds to beat Brossoit.
“We’re apprehensive,” McLellan explained later. “We are making terrible reads. Twenty seconds into the game, we’re pinching, and we have no covering because we lost a player behind the net.”
Things went downhill from there.
A bad penalty for too many guys on the ice. The Oilers killed it without allowing a shot.
Then, irritated by the referee’s non-call, forward Patrick Maroon took a stupid penalty for interfering away from the play. The Canes made the Oilers pay when Teuvu Teravainen scored his second goal of the game.
When asked about Maroon’s penalty, McLellan replied, “I didn’t like it.” Four minutes in, we’ve made enough blunders to put ourselves 2-0 down, and it’ll be a tough fight back from there.”
That’s tough. Early on, the Rogers Place crowd’s loudest cheers went to the insane guy who danced to the strains of Mony Mony while peeling off orange Oilers T-shirts and throwing them into the throng. I wonder if he gives out extra shirts when the home team loses?
The next error occurred when the home team was on the penalty kill again. This time, Oilers defenseman Adam Larsson placed himself in a bad position by chasing the puck out near the blue line. That left his partner, Oscar Klefbom, alone to face a two-on-one in front of the net.
One pass, one shot, and another goal—3-0.
The Oilers pushed well for much of the game, but they continued making mistakes that harmed themselves.
They blasted pucks from all directions. However, their efforts were not rewarded until Mark Letestu scored the team’s 31st shot of the game. The power-play goal, his first of the season, upped the score 3-1 Hurricanes.
As the minutes passed, the Oilers continued to fire pucks at Canes goaltender Cam Ward. It seemed that if they just kept shooting, something was bound to go in.
The Oilers had already seized the momentum early in the third period. They were once again playing the power play. Milan Lucic sent a pass across the blue line to Klefbom. Klefbom misplayed the pass while skating, and Canes center Jordan Staal collected the puck, ran the length of the ice, and put the game out of reach.
“If we had kept it at three, I believe we would have been in a terrific position to get back into the hockey game,” Letestu added. “We are currently giving away opportunities, which is costing us money.”
There were bright spots. One came on the same power play, when Oilers winger Ryan Strome tipped a point shot past Ward to make the score 4-2.
Fans have criticized the winger since he arrived from the New York Islanders in a contentious off-season trade for Jordan Eberle.
The newcomer received some fan support when he broke in on another rush, was slammed to the floor, but managed to keep the puck. Strome produced a fantastic behind-the-back pass from his knees, which Lucic shot into the net to draw the Oilers within one goal.
“In the third period, we had an opportunity to get back into the game, and we did,” Strome stated afterwards. “So, I suppose they are the small things you can build on. I believe we are accomplishing a lot of good, but we often abandon ambitions at the wrong time. When we outshoot a team by more than two to one, we lose. So it’s becoming a little frustrating.
Lucic’s goal
Halfway through the period, Canes defenseman Jacob Slavin participated in a rush that got two Oilers players bunched together between the face-off circles in front of their net. His goal made the score 5-3.
The game is over.
The Oilers are now on the road for three key games in Chicago, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh. If they lose those three, a team that started 7-1 last season will drop to 1-7.
