Call me negative, but I knew the moment that Nick Ritchie scored that the dream was over, at least for now it was. The Ducks had taken control of the hockey game and now, with less than a period to play, had taken the lead. For a young Oiler team on the road, the task was simply too much.
And so it was over, the magical 2016-17 season found its expiration date to be May 10th, 2017. A disappointing end to a wild and fun ride, but an end that came at least a month later than I thought it would. It’s going to sting, the Oilers choked this series away in my mind, but in the end it has the potential to be a VERY important lesson.
When I say the Oilers choked the series away, I mean that I believe they had ample opportunity to win it and likely should have. The Oilers took a 2-0 series lead on the road and led game four 2-0 through twenty minutes before ultimately losing that tilt in OT. Game five was even more devastating, blowing a 3-0 lead with 3:16 left and losing in double OT.
The Oilers, one can argue, should have had this series
wrapped up in five games. They didn’t, and even a dominating game six victory could not save them from the Ducks in game seven. It’s a bitter end, because deep down I truly believe the Oilers missed a golden opportunity to advance to the West Final. That’s life, and it’s a life this team will have to live with.
The blown leads, both in games and in series, will haunt this Oiler team all summer long, as it should. That, my friends, is part of the lesson here. The Oilers need to learn to put teams away in a series when everyone knows the opponent will be bringing its best game. The Oilers need to learn how to play in a game seven and how to deal with adversity.
It sucks that they lost, but this Oilers team just got a hard lesson in everything that I stated in the last paragraph. It is going to sting today, tomorrow and all summer long, but come next April, May and June, it will help this hockey club, mark my words.
All that said, it was still a disappointing ending to the season.
A Resounding Success:
The Edmonton Oilers’ season was a success, there is no way around that fact. I pegged the club to finish with 85 points and fight for a postseason berth. They blew that out of the water by eclipsing 100 points and making the postseason. That alone, after ten years out of the playoffs and a 29th place finish in 2015-16, is a success.
The fact that the Oilers then won a playoff series against the San Jose Sharks, no easy task even if they were hurt, and took the Ducks to the brink in game seven is only icing on the cake. It proves that these Oilers are not just a good team, but proves they are a legit contender moving forward. One bounce and the Oilers are preparing to play Nashville right now.
Lowetide has always talked about turning north on his blog, and I think this is exactly what he was talking about. The 2016-17 season saw the Edmonton Oilers go from punchline to contender almost overnight. In fact, I think the goal next season has to be to truly try and win the Stanley Cup.
Connor McDavid shown brightest, Leon Draisaitl proved to be a core piece, Oscar Klefbom, Adam Larsson, Darnell Nurse and Cam Talbot all emerged as terrific contributors and Anton Slepyshev, Matt Benning and Drake Caggiula all proved that they can handle the NHL.
For the first time in what seems like forever, the Oilers are trending up. They turned north this season (I love this phrase, thanks Lowetide!) and they emerged as a legit threat in the NHL. With that will come higher expectations, but we will talk about those in the fall.
One Last Thing:
After years of being terrible, this season was very enjoyable for the Oilers and their fans. That said, it is time to change the mindset. Folks, the rebuild is over. The Oilers are also no longer a growth team, that has been thrown out the window. A growth team doesn’t push the Anaheim Ducks to game seven in the second round.
The Edmonton Oilers are, and you may wanna sit down for this, a Stanley Cup contender. As a result, they need to be treated that way by their GM. I had no problem with Peter Chiarelli standing pat at the deadline outside of the David Desharnais trade, but this summer needs to be an aggressive one for the GM.
The Oilers have a window to win a Stanley Cup, and it is now officially open. Matt Henderson goes in-depth with this point over at OilersNation and you can read his piece here. I agree with his point and I believe that Chiarelli should aggressively pursue any and all upgrades to this roster over the summer. It’s the right thing to do.
The goal for 2017-18 must be to compete for and win the Stanley Cup. Peter Chiarelli owes it to his roster to treat this summer as such. Personally, I have the faith in him to do just that. I’m hoping he rewards that faith.
A year from now, the Oilers should still be playing hockey. This is a new era folks, the Edmonton Oilers are no joke. I firmly believe that the spring of 2017 was this club’s coming out party. As Connor McDavid said, “We’ll be back.”
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