Disaster In The D-Zone

The title says it all. The Edmonton Oilers are, and have been for years now, a disaster in the d-zone. The problems are quite clear. The team does not have a stud defender, the team does not have four legit NHL top-four defenders, the group does not grasp the concept of a defensive system, and the forwards are close to useless when trying to help.

It’s becoming almost laughable, the amount of clear mistakes the Oilers make in their defensive zone. Look no further than last night’s 6-2 shelling at the hands of the Coyotes. Four of the Yotes goals are easily preventable, whether it be from having actual defensive zone coverage, or even average NHL goaltending, which is an issue within it’s own. Let’s break it all down.

Goaltending:

Let’s be totally honest here, both goalies that entered the season on the Oilers roster have been major failures. Jason Labarbera was awful in all but one start, where he still gave up three goals to New Jersey. He was sent to OKC for a reason, and is only up in Edmonton again because of injury. This was a major swing and miss over the summer by MacT. Labarbera just isn’t good enough, and failed to give the Oilers quality starts.

Devan Dubnyk is playing out the final months of his Oilers career right now, and he can thank one of the worst goaltending performances in franchise history during the first 20 games for that. Dubnyk was terrible at the start of the season, and cost the Oilers about four wins. That is bad. He failed to give the team a big save when they most needed it, and failed to instill confidence in a young team. He’s better than that, but his performance was simply awful.

MacT went looking for goaltending help this past summer, and it is safe to say this position will be getting an overhaul when the real Oilers season, the draft and free agency, open up in late June. It’s safe to say both Labarbera and Dubnyk will not be retained, and someone else will be coming to town.

The Oilers goaltending has just started to turn the corner. There isn’t a point to go deeper into this. Goaltending isn’t the biggest issue, but it certainly has been a disappointment this year. There will be change at this position I’m fairly confident. There really isn’t anything else to it.

Defensive Coverage….AKA The Reason We Drink:

I’ve watched hockey my entire life. I’m not that old, in fact I’m just 19 years old, I’m pretty young. That said, I’ve never seen a team play this bad defensively, and I’ve spent every night during hockey season the last ten years watching at least some sort of game. I’ve watched high school level teams play better defensively and seen youth teams that understand coverage better than the Oilers do.

This is an NHL team, there is no excuse for not knowing how to cover your man, there is no excuse for three Oilers to be behind the net chasing two players, as was the case last night. It isn’t just the defenders, it’s everyone on the roster.

Is the system part of that? Absolutely it is. It isn’t all on the system, but when a whole team is struggling to grasp a concept, some of the fault needs to fall on the coaches and their staff…..More on that later on.

There is no defender that is playing good enough right now. Jeff Petry is looking like he has regressed these last few games. He is playing in a role he isn’t cut out for and is struggling. Justin Schultz is learning on the fly, as is Anton Belov, who has struggled from time-to-time this year. Nick Schultz? Nothing great. Ference? A good number four playing higher than he should in the rotation.

The Oilers have Petry and Ference as legit top-four guys, don’t have a top-pairing guy and have too many defenders learning on the fly. That’s an issue. The unit, on paper, simply isn’t very good, and it is showing on the ice. Guys are chasing the puck and as a result there are open guys all over the place, whether it be at the front of the net, or in the slot.

To fix this? Edmonton is going to need a top-pairing guy, an Ehrhoff, Campbell or Phaneuf. They’ll also need another guy, maybe a Coburn or a Sami Salo kind of player. There are multiple player needs on the blue-line, and that is just the start of it.

Guys like Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Nail Yakupov, Ales Hemsky and especially Sam Gagner don’t know how to be 200 foot players. You can’t have guys that are just there for offense, and sadly that is exactly what Edmonton has right now. Gagner’s gaffe last night is the poster-child play for what is wrong with the Oilers forwards.

They try too hard to cheat for offense and don’t show any urgency in the defensive zone. They are too content with just sitting there waiting for their defenders to do all the dirty work and then go score a goal. It doesn’t work that way, and until the Oilers fix that and get these players to play actual NHL hockey, the losing will continue.

The Oilers, as I have talked about before, need a different mix. The players are a major problem right now, and the losing will continue with these junior style defensive gaffes and offensive players.

Coaching:

First thing is first, Steve Smith and Kelly Buchberger need to go. The Oilers defense has been a mess since Smith took over coaching the unit. The young players have not progressed, and others have actually regressed since coming to Edmonton. The Oilers once had Charlie Huddy behind the bench, who was an awesome defensive coach, and set guys like Gilbert, Smid, Grebeshkov, Staios and Jason Smith in the right direction.

Since Smith has taken over, things have not been the same and the Oilers defense has been in the basement of the league. Buchberger also has been through three coaches now and quite frankly shouldn’t be here. He isn’t an Eakins guy, and Eakins should at least be able to bring in people that share the same philosophy as he does.

David Staples of the Edmonton Journal said it best, the Oilers need a veteran assistant coach to come in and help Eakins out while being able to help the Oilers defensive game. This is a fundamentals issue more than anything right now, and adding a veteran assistant might be the best thing the Oilers can do to help these struggling players. Teaching fundamentals should be easy, but it is clear that the message hasn’t sunk in with this team yet.

The Final Words:

Things are ugly in Edmonton right now. The Oilers are going to miss the playoffs for the eighth year and a row, and that is unacceptable. The team needs to figure it out defensively. They must be better in terms of defensive assignments and must be more committed to playing a complete game. Until it happens, this will continue. The Oilers need to make changes both player wise and systematic wise. Things are a mess right now, but hey, they always say it is darkest before dawn.