Oilers Gameday – @ New Jersey

The Oilers are back in action tonight in New Jersey, and hopefully they’ll put forth a little bit more of an effort than they did on the weekend. After scoring 12 goals in two games last week, the mighty Oil were outscored 13-2 against Montreal and the New York Islanders.

I’m hoping for some kind of turnaround tonight, and apparently the Oilers haven’t lost to the Devils in NJ since 1997. You know what that means, don’t you? *cue Slumpbusters entrance music*

“The Devils haven’t beaten the Oilers in NJ since 1997” is the equivalent to “This goalie is playing his first NHL game against the Oilers”.

— Rascal Gas (@rascalgas) February 9, 2016

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Last Games

Edmonton

Seriously? The Oilers got curbstomped on Sunday afternoon, losing 8-1 to the New York Islanders. The Islanders aren’t the best team in the league, but on Sunday it was a case of a real hockey team against a bunch of guys who play sometimes on Friday nights between beers.

There’s not much to say about it, so I won’t belabour the point – they were terrible and it was a chore to watch, and the bad football game the broke out at the Super Bowl didn’t help matters later on. Terrible sports day.

New Jersey Devils

The Devils lost their last game 2-1 to the New York Rangers. The Devils are a team that I don’t really pay attention to unless they’re playing the Oilers. I do know that tonight is some kind of Martin Brodeur appreciation night, so that should be fun and also ruin any pre-game prep the Oilers have done.

Keys to the Game

Edmonton

Man, I don’t even know. There were so many good things last week, and then so many bad things on the weekend. Here goes

• Stop sucking would be a good start.
• Keep Justin Schultz away from the puck in the defensive zone would be another. PROBLEM SOLVED THANK GORD.
• I’d say get the puck to Connor, but that didn’t seem to work too well the last couple games.
• Jordan and Taylor: FOR THE LOVE OF EVERYTHING HOLY STOP CARRYING THE PUCK IN ALONG THE BOARDS AND GETTING DOUBLE-TEAMED AND LOSING THE PUCK.
• Benoit: PLEASE DON’T TRY TO TIP THE PUCK AWAY FROM THE NET WHEN YOU ARE STANDING IN THE SLOT.

New Jersey

Keep the puck away from anyone good. Screen the goalie. Take penalties and then score short-handed.

tl;dr – it’s so easy to beat the Oilers, the Habs did it AND scored 5 goals in the process.

Players to Watch

Edmonton

Watch Taylor Hall. He’s great, and this past weekend, he was probably the best of the Oilers (no bias). Also, he and Connor play Crazy 8s at home together and if that isn’t the greatest thing you’ve ever heard, you need to start listening.

I’d say that you should watch Justin Schultz and look for his Norris potential, but you can’t because he’s (finally, mercifully) been scratched.

According to Coach McLellan:

“He needs to watch a game and reflect on his play and what his impact is both offensively and defensively.” Coach McLellan on Schultz

— Edmonton Oilers (@EdmontonOilers) February 9, 2016

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js (Because of this, my friend Kelsey has called an Oilers win. If she’s wrong, direct your anger to @kelseystyre on Twitter.)

New Jersey

Watch Cory Schneider and remember that time he wasn’t good enough to play in Vancouver, and then laugh forever.

Projected Lineups

Edmonton

Taylor Hall – Leon Draisaitl – Iiro Pakarinen

Benoit Pouliot – Connor McDavid – Jordan Eberle

Teddy Purcell – Mark Letestu – Nail Yakupov

Lauri Korpikoski – Matt Hendricks – Zack Kassian

Andrej Sekera – mark Fayne

Brandon Davidson – Eric Gryba

Darnell Nurse – Adam Clendening

Cam Tal-Bot

New Jersey

(I should clarify that I’m not sure if 50% of this team is real…I italicized the names I’ve never heard of)

Joseph Blandisi – Adam Henrique – Lee Stempniak

Sergey Kalinin – Travis Zajac – Kyle Palmieri

Reid Boucher – Jacob Josefson – Tyler Kennedy

Bobby Farnham – Stephen Gionta – Jordin Tootoo

Andy Green – Adam Larsson

Eric Gelinas – David Schlemko

Damon Severson – John Moore

Cory Schneider

Final Thoughts

The Oilers weren’t making the playoffs this year, so I think it’s kind of funny that people are so upset they’re performing so poorly. One of the things I’ve figured out over the last couple seasons is that no matter what happens, the fortunes of the Oilers aren’t going to affect my day-to-day life. Mostly. (Until they make the playoffs and go on a Cup run and my life will be ruined again.)

That being said, I’ve been a fan of a garbage team for so long that I would LOVE it if they’d just win once in a while, and do it consistently. I was talking to a friend last night about the Oilers (because of course I was) and it got me thinking about people who are fans of other teams. It must be nice right now to be a fan of, say, the Blackhawks (Patrick Kane garbage notwithstanding) because they win and they do it often. How fun would that be, to watch a team that isn’t godawful sometimes?

I can’t ignore that the Oilers are, in fact, better than last year. And there have been a few games where we’ve seen the potential for what COULD be. They’re not there yet, and that’s okay (for the rest of this season, at least).

It could be worse.

We could be Chicago Cubs fans.