Post-Game Talk: Oilers took a working vacation too

[Kirby]

Mini-slump now but that's to be expected after 16 straight wins.

Here's my problem with this game: McDavid, I thought, was great in all areas, but the other top-line guys on the ice were so bad defensively --- Nuge and Hyman. Connor was out there hitting guys in the D-zone, breaking up 2-on-1's, and the other two were lollygagging the whole night in their own zone (and, as usual, defensive zone faceoff losses by Nuge leading to goals). Nuge and Hyman need to bear down defensively a lot more.

The opening shift in period 1, and the opening shift in period 2, were complete disasters. Nuge and Hyman take a lot of the blame for that.

I'm sorry...what?

Were we watching the same game? McDavid hit Neighbors in the corner, wow great play? McDavid then immediately got beat by Neighbors out from behind the net, and is chasing Neighbor's while trying to reach him with his stick being almost two steps behind, Neighbors makes a play, St. Louis scores.

On multiple occasions McDavid was a floating spinning top, and was in picture doing nothing except for being out of position defensively the entire night. He made multiple bad plays that led directly to chaos and goals in the defensive zone. Go back and watch the first couple shifts where Hyman has to disrupt a player in the slot from behind on a one-time pass from the corner. McDavid, who appears to be "covering" the St. Louis player, last minute decided he's not going to because he's going to skate into the corner to try and be the third man support (this should of been his spot from the beginning, but instead he floated in the middle of the ice doing nothing). As he vacates the man in the dangerous scoring area, it is Hyman that identifies and makes a great last minute effort to disrupt the one-timer as the puck goes through McDavid as he's skating into the corner and away from the danger player he was sort of covering. This not commitment on proper positioning left his linemates in shit positions to cover anything, especially when McDavid then left his positions to chase and float.

Go watch McDavid attempt to kill the penalty on the fifth St. Louis goal. I guess it was McLeod 's fault that McDavid vacated the defensive position to force a puck from the blue line up the wall, which then was passed through the seem that McDavid opened for St.Louis by swinging high on the blue line, and then being in picture doing nothing on the rebound because he was to far away to collapse?

Did he throw 1 hit and back check on 1 two on one? Sure, but if you honestly believe he wasn't the reason his line was giving up goals this game then I have no idea what you were watching.

 

[RegDunlop]

The “refs don’t influence” the game crowd had a tough night. Told you the inconsistency and incompetence of the refs hurts us. What a joke.

The refs definitely influenced the game. But the lack of awareness and proper defensive play lost us the game.

 

[mkatcherin00]

Doesn’t matter what we pick up if Skinner plays like last night. He proved it in the playoffs last year

It doesn't matter who we get anywhere

Can you trust this team to keep playing a structured game? They did it for an extended streak and just stopped now

Thats all discipline and hustling. Physically hustling to your spots stops a few goals every game that have gone in.

If they are not going to consistently buy in, the deadline is going to mean Jack
So far after the break, they have been frauds

Liked Vegas game, but this team is a perimeter team that usually refuses to shoot.

Streaky team. Better hope they streak starting the playoffs because they look bad when they streak the other way team is way too hot and cold

Contenders don't do that

3 games against better teams post all star break and three losses

 

[KeithIsActuallyBad]

Hopefully the GM isn’t still in a coma…

 

[BudBundy]

Doesn’t matter what we pick up if Skinner plays like last night. He proved it in the playoffs last year

Which of those goals would you expect a goalie to stop?

 

[RegDunlop]

Morning all

As we all breakdown our shit effort last night I'm reminded that when we are bickering about who's to blame, how we adapt, who we need, etc, it means that we all recognize we could be in real trouble.

I know we're too smart here to think that our winning streak was all positive and that we don't need help via trades, players out, and a return to the structure we found in January. I just hope management isn't going to simply bandaid the needs again.

I am on board with Skinner and think Pickard can be ok. But what if they're not? What's the plan? It's still only his second season.
Not necessarily against Ceci as a lot of you are but what's the plan for depth at least? We need 1 or 2 NHL capable defenceman for a run.
I'd like a upper end RW but not the most important upgrade as we should be able to have enough offense but bottom 6 or at least 4th line needs more.

I'm usually not this negative after a loss but as most are pointing out, we haven't been at the top of our game for a while. I've never bought into the 'only beating weaker teams' mandate but I'm starting to suspect it may be relative. Putting a lot of faith (and hope!) Into tomorrow's matinee. We really need to soundly beat a good team.

Ok rant over. Sorry for so long. And I apologize for being crabby last night. Game pissed me off too much!

 

[CupofOil]

Once you're done watching BB (one of my all time favorite shows), you can watch Better Call Saul, the prequel, which I think is even better than BB.

Ehh, I'm going to have to disagree with that one but BCS certainly was a worthy sequel or should I say, prequel.

 

[McShogun99]

What bugs me the most about our post all star break play is the 3 games we needed to win to gain ground on Vegas, LA and STL, we lost. At least the team showed some effort in the Vegas came but played like complete ass since then.

Mcdavid is starting to play like he's more focused on trying to win the Art Ross over winning games right now. Team defence is reverting back to Woodcroft level. During the intermission one of the STL players was saying how Edmonton's PK formation was easy to pick apart and create space, looks like opposing coaches are finding holes in Knob's systems.

 

[jesusbuiltmyhotrod]

Hopefully the GM isn’t still in a coma…

Oh look oilers lose and you come back from hiding, always negative. Shocker

 

[GOilers88]

Who has the Fire Knoblauch thread ready to go?

 

[frag2]

Mini-slump now but that's to be expected after 16 straight wins.

Here's my problem with this game: McDavid, I thought, was great in all areas, but the other top-line guys on the ice were so bad defensively --- Nuge and Hyman. Connor was out there hitting guys in the D-zone, breaking up 2-on-1's, and the other two were lollygagging the whole night in their own zone (and, as usual, defensive zone faceoff losses by Nuge leading to goals). Nuge and Hyman need to bear down defensively a lot more.

The opening shift in period 1, and the opening shift in period 2, were complete disasters. Nuge and Hyman take a lot of the blame for that.

Nuge and Hyman have been pretty abysmal the last 5-6 tbh. Most of their good comes directly from a play started by McD. So if McD struggles, they struggle even more.

Defensively, I have no idea what's going on with Nuge. I don't expect Hyman to be defensively sound [ffs he's usually cheating at our blue line more often than not, waiting for loose puck] but Nuge has been uncharacteristically bad defensively lately.

I'm sorry...what?

Were we watching the same game? McDavid hit Neighbors in the corner, wow great play? McDavid then immediately got beat by Neighbors out from behind the net, and is chasing Neighbor's while trying to reach him with his stick being almost two steps behind, Neighbors makes a play, St. Louis scores.

On multiple occasions McDavid was a floating spinning top, and was in picture doing nothing except for being out of position defensively the entire night. He made multiple bad plays that led directly to chaos and goals in the defensive zone. Go back and watch the first couple shifts where Hyman has to disrupt a player in the slot from behind on a one-time pass from the corner. McDavid, who appears to be "covering" the St. Louis player, last minute decided he's not going to because he's going to skate into the corner to try and be the third man support (this should of been his spot from the beginning, but instead he floated in the middle of the ice doing nothing). As he vacates the man in the dangerous scoring area, it is Hyman that identifies and makes a great last minute effort to disrupt the one-timer as the puck goes through McDavid as he's skating into the corner and away from the danger player he was sort of covering. This not commitment on proper positioning left his linemates in shit positions to cover anything, especially when McDavid then left his positions to chase and float.

Go watch McDavid attempt to kill the penalty on the fifth St. Louis goal. I guess it was McLeod 's fault that McDavid vacated the defensive position to force a puck from the blue line up the wall, which then was passed through the seem that McDavid opened for St.Louis by swinging high on the blue line, and then being in picture doing nothing on the rebound because he was to far away to collapse?

Did he throw 1 hit and back check on 1 two on one? Sure, but if you honestly believe he wasn't the reason his line was giving up goals this game then I have no idea what you were watching.

We get it. You're on a mission to shit on McD

 

[Lacaar]

I think if we're being honest with the team on that game.

1. They lost their composure. There was no put your head down and get to work. And it came from their leaders. Dumb penalty from Draisitl .. Check.
2. McDavid was a defensive disaster... Check.

This team has an attitude problem when things don't go their way. They showed they can deal with it sometimes in that win streak. But it creeps back with success. It was talked about last year and into the summer. Draisitl gets pissy and McDavid forgets how to play defense.

The oilers lost because they played an immature game last night.

I'm not really upset that they had a night like the night. I'm upset at their response. Instead of getting pissed off and saying.. f*** it.. let's make life miserable for the Blues. They just took more stupid stick calls. If the blues are going to get the calls.. throw a god damn mother f***ing body check for gods sake. Did we take even 1 penalty for a check? or were they all those lazy pissy holds and sticks.

This team thinks they're all McDavids sometimes.

 

[Soundwave]

First two goals I think are on RNH, third goal was on Hyman.

That said, man was it ever a night/day difference in terms of how fast Binnington is going laterally and how much second effort he has when he's down, whereas Skinner is painfully slow.

 

[KeithIsActuallyBad]

Oh look oilers lose and you come back from hiding, always negative. Shocker

I've posted three times in this thread, dude.

The team needs upgrades, is that somehow debatable here?

 

[russ99]

Rather see this group fall apart effort-wise now before the deadline than after or in the postseason.

 

[WaitingForUser]

The Blues played a strong game but it's easy to look good when you get seven power-plays to the other teams two. Two.

8 actually it was 7 in a row

 

[RegDunlop]

I think if we're being honest with the team on that game.

1. They lost their composure. There was no put your head down and get to work. And it came from their leaders. Dumb penalty from Draisitl .. Check.
2. McDavid was a defensive disaster... Check.

This team has an attitude problem when things don't go their way. They showed they can deal with it sometimes in that win streak. But it creeps back with success. It was talked about last year and into the summer. Draisitl gets pissy and McDavid forgets how to play defense.

The oilers lost because they played an immature game last night.

I'm not really upset that they had a night like the night. I'm upset at their response. Instead of getting pissed off and saying.. f*** it.. let's make life miserable for the Blues. They just took more stupid stick calls. If the blues are going to get the calls.. throw a god damn mother f***ing body check for gods sake. Did we take even 1 penalty for a check? or were they all those lazy pissy holds and sticks.

This team thinks they're all McDavids sometimes.

True
Drais slew foot, Ceci's slash to break stick, and even Holloway's xcheck, although suspect, we're all stupid and unnecessary. Sniper Brown with a dumb one and Vinny's tantrum all contributed to the shit performance. Elite teams nip these things in the bud. Let's see if we clean up our act.

 

[Sra1974]

What bugs me the most about our post all star break play is the 3 games we needed to win to gain ground on Vegas, LA and STL, we lost. At least the team showed some effort in the Vegas came but played like complete ass since then.

Mcdavid is starting to play like he's more focused on trying to win the Art Ross over winning games right now. Team defence is reverting back to Woodcroft level. During the intermission one of the STL players was saying how Edmonton's PK formation was easy to pick apart and create space, looks like opposing coaches are finding holes in Knob's systems.

I don‘t think for a second it’s about winning the Art Ross but I think it’s the pressure to carry the offense. When the bottom six dries up, Drai struggles then I think he starts to feel the need to be the only guy to drive the offense. And he’s not wrong, but the issue is when he gets in this mode the defensive side really starts to show holes.

 

[frag2]

Too many of our forwards are perimeter players. Besides Hyman and maybe Kane (plus now Perry), our wingers are content to be boxed out. No opponents get pushed or pulled out of position. Nobody is ever having to hook or hold us to defend. Nuge, and Foegele are most guilty of this. I see some signs of Holloway and McLoed getting after it a bit more, but them too. Connor Brown has no idea what he’s doing anywhere. We aren’t getting past the structured teams like Vegas and LA without more guys that force the issue physically when they don’t have the puck.

We probably have the softest set of wingers in the league. lol

I don‘t think for a second it’s about winning the Art Ross but I think it’s the pressure to carry the offense. When the bottom six dries up, Drai struggles then I think he starts to feel the need to be the only guy to drive the offense. And he’s not wrong, but the issue is when he gets in this mode the defensive side really starts to show holes.

This

 

[SupremeTeam16]

Nuge and Hyman have been pretty abysmal the last 5-6 tbh. Most of their good comes directly from a play started by McD. So if McD struggles, they struggle even more.

Defensively, I have no idea what's going on with Nuge. I don't expect Hyman to be defensively sound [ffs he's usually cheating at our blue line more often than not, waiting for loose puck] but Nuge has been uncharacteristically bad defensively lately.



We get it. You're on a mission to shit on McD

Defensive structure is so reliant on your C. When the C isn’t where he is supposed to be that is when systems collapse.

When McDavid is playing the position how it’s typically played, which is supporting down low and at net front, then we see much stronger structure. The problems occur when he starts leaking up higher anticipating a quick transition chance, or when he gets caught between checks trying to pick passes and generate quick transition chances. That’s when you start seeing opponents wide open in the slot and when that happens the winger naturally wants to abandon his man to cover the guy who’s more of a threat. This is when you end up with a bunch of guys running around, the coverage breaks down and the opponent gets a quality chance. When the C wanders in the defensive zone that’s when you get outnumbered at the net as well, which is a big problem for us.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that when McDavid scores at a slightly lower rate our defensive play gets better but when McDavid is scoring 3-4-5 pts a game we usually end up in 5-4 and 6-5 games. Definitely not the type of game you want to play in the playoffs.

 

[Soundwave]

Defensive structure is so reliant on your C. When the C isn’t where he is supposed to be that is when systems collapse.

When McDavid is playing the position how it’s typically played, which is supporting down low and at net front, then we see much stronger structure. The problems occur when he starts leaking up higher anticipating a quick transition chance, or when he gets caught between checks trying to pick passes and generate quick transition chances. That’s when you start seeing opponents wide open in the slot and when that happens the winger naturally wants to abandon his man to cover the guy who’s more of a threat. This is when you end up with a bunch of guys running around, the coverage breaks down and the opponent gets a quality chance. When the C wanders in the defensive zone that’s when you get outnumbered at the net as well, which is a big problem for us.

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that when McDavid scores at a slightly lower rate our defensive play gets better but when McDavid is scoring 3-4-5 pts a game we usually end up in 5-4 and 6-5 games. Definitely not the type of game you want to play in the playoffs.

RNH and Hyman were bad defensively last night. That's not all on McDavid.

 

[Rpenny]

Yet Vancouver hasn’t hesitated to do what the Oilers should be doing, bringing in players that will strengthen the team! They brought in players like DeSmith, Cole, Soucy in the off season and now have traded for the likes of Zadorov and Lindholm while the Oilers have done nothing! Vancouver is going for it all in and the Oilers wait with bated breath for Connor Brown’s first goal !!

there is this nasty thing called the cap. Vancouver had more wiggle room. Their GM is more dynamic than our GM but we are against the cap and unless you are talking about trading one of Nuge, Kane, Hyman or Leon? The player we want to move we will need to add. Vancouver had two players that the sold low on for good return, Beauville and Kuzmenko. Moving those two contracts were key.

In the off season we had no wiggle room with the cap due to the Campbell contract and a need to sign a few key guys. How many first are you will to trade for another team to take him? How Holland fell into the Ekholm trade is great.
The one team I keep thinking about trading Campbell to is the Sharks. Campbell and a 1st for Kahkonen. Wishful thinking. But. hey, One can dream

 

[WaitingForUser]

Bad team effort even worse officiating and it adds up to what we saw. Park it and move on. They do need to call out the BS though before the playoffs. This will give time for the league to punish them for speaking out when the games don’t mean nearly as much: as I’ve noticed everyone we call them out it gets worse for a few games then evens out a bit.

Ehh, I'm going to have to disagree with that one but BCS certainly was a worthy sequel or should I say, prequel.

Agreed BB was the best TV show ever made. It didn’t drag on and make people lose interest and there was not one piece of filler that I saw on the whole show. Absolutely perfect

 

[tfwnogf]

This team thinks they're all McDavids sometimes.

Yea I see that too, I remember at the start of the season under Woody it was especially bad. Just because McDavid can do some cool 1v4 play or a spin move the rest of them thought they were superhuman too. I just want to pull them aside and say "you're not that guy, bro". Keep it simple. Like the blues did. Good passing, tire the Oilers out and score.

This is the first real test for the Knobinator after his super extended honeymoon period. I hope he can reel the team in and get them back to winning ways. I think Coffey is a huge benefit to have too.

 

[SupremeTeam16]

RNH and Hyman were bad defensively last night. That's not all on McDavid.

I’m not saying they weren’t because they definitely were.

My point is that the C is the lynchpin in your defensive structure and it’s no coincidence that when our top 6 C’s play their part within the structure we see much better defensive efforts across the board generally the results have been we win more games.

When our top 6 C’s get scoring focused, their defensive play suffers and as a result the defensive play of those around them does as well. When this happens wins get a lot harder because you’re having to outscore your poor defensive play like they did against Detroit but couldn’t do against STL.