Meet the Blogger: Mailbag Edition 2

Over the next few weeks, we’re going to reintroduce our readers to the crew here at the Oilers Rig. With a number of new writers on board, we thought it would be a good idea to let you all know who exactly is writing about your favourite team. Basically, we thought it would be a good opportunity for you all to Meet the Blogger.

Read last week’s post here.

What led you to cheer for the Oilers?

Dave Gordon

I think I was born with an Oilers jersey, but I think my love for the Oilers was solidified in 1988 during the Stanley cup finals when our class was divided between Bruins and Oilers fans.

Jackie Dawson

I was born and raised an Oilers fan, I can thank my Dad for that. Hockey has always been a big part of my life but as I got older my love for the Oilers grew and grew…as did my hatred for the Flames. Nothing beats the 80’s Battle of Alberta rivalry.

Alex Thomas

Went to a game in the early 2000’s in Boston and they wore the gear third jerseys, absolutely loved those. Ryan Smyth won my heart that day and the Oilers lost by six goals. Fitting really, like they were trying to warn me….

Jon McLeod

When I started to collect hockey cards in the 80s, I decided I should pick a favourite team. At that time, the Oilers seemed like a good team to cheer for. The Stanley Cups were nice, but I was too young to consider the effects of living on the East Coast and cheering for a western team.

Megan Fowler

Proximity, mostly. My parents had season tickets when I was a kid, and I got to go to games once in a while. I was also lucky enough to be a little kid when the Oilers were hot fire and winning Stanley Cups like they were going out of style. I stuck by the team through the early 90s (even when my favourites were traded away) and when Todd Marchant scored that goal against the Stars in 1997, I wasn’t just on the bandwagon, I was right up near the front so I couldn’t even contemplate jumping off.

When I lived in Ireland (a full 7 hours ahead of Edmonton), I only missed 4 of the 48 games of the
(lockout shortened) 2012-13 season. My mom would FaceTime me at random times (1:45am, 2:30am, even 3:00am) so that I could be awake to watch the games on a crappy feed from FirstRowSports.

Now I just can’t quit them, no matter how hard I try.

Kelly (BLH)

Edmonton’s close proximity to my birth city… I’ll be honest, as a youth I was brainwashed er… I mean influenced by my father who was a huge fan of Gretzky and the dynasty Oilers. But I’ve always been one to go against the grain a bit and when I was old enough to, I did. I started cheering for Gretzky’s greatest rival, Mario Lemieux, and continued to do so until he retired. By that time Crosby was around, so my allegiance to the Penguins was still strong but cheering for the team that was a perennial winner (regular season at least) became boring and the Oilers were the team NOT to cheer for because they were so horrible. PERFECT!

I’ve been a draft geek since I was a kid and what better team to help facilitate my addiction to the draft than a team that selects in the first 5 picks year after year after year… after year… after year…

So here we are and now the team is finally starting to dig itself out of its hole. There are no more old Oilers running the team anymore and as a blogger I’m bittersweet because there’s less to write about when the team is doing the right things but alas that is the life we choose.

Kris Hansen

My Dad. When I was a kid I was choosing a team to cheer for and I NEARLY became a Flames fan because I thought the Flaming C looked cool. My dad didn’t have any of that. He told me Edmonton had a team and I was blown away. Wow! Edmonton has an NHL team?!?

Been a fan ever since. People complain about how they’re long suffering but I don’t care. I’ll support them thick and thin. Want to see them succeed and I think with McDavid, Chiarelli and McLellan in place, they are on the right path regardless what the cynics say.

Ali Arshad

I started watching hockey from game one of the 05-06 regular season. (Avalanche, Shawn Horcoff had two goals, more on that to follow). I had a friend in my class who I would talk hockey to, and that really drew me into the game. Shawn Horcoff and Chris Pronger kept me interested for the remaining games in the mediocre regular season. And then of course the playoffs. I was so fortunate to go through a cup run in my first season; it really cemented my relationship with the Oilers.

Avry Lewis-McDougall

The 1997 playoffs. Seriously. As a 23 year old that may sound weird but I was hooked on the team at a very young age and that squad that took down a LOADED Dallas Stars roster was special. Curtis Joseph was nuts and that Oilers team would outwork you from the opening faceoff until the final horn.

Those late 90s and early 2000s teams kept me hanging around as a youngin.