The Edmonton Oilers have won four of their last five and are marching into Montreal to take on one of the NHL’s hottest teams, the Canadiens. Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl’s 9-game point streaks were snapped against Ottawa, will they find the scoresheet again or might the Oilers have to depend on depth scoring again for the two points against a Montreal team who’s on the latter half of a back-to-back?
Should they be in the lineup, here are three players that I think you should keep an eye on for the Habs tonight,
- #14 Nick Suzuki – What a fantastic young two-way talent we’re witnessing here. He might have Patrice Bergeron written all over him. Suzuki is so smart on the ice and at such a young age no less. If Phillip Danault ends up playing somewhere else next year, having Suzuki on the roster should make that transition less painful.
- #34 Jake Allen – Has had some success against Edmonton in the past. You know how the Oilers are against backups… Connor McDavid didn’t score in his last game out though, so I’m thinking Allen is going to have his work cut out for him in this one.
- #17 Josh Anderson – This hulking behemoth has four goals in his last five games, if I’m not mistaken, and is an absolute handful for opposing defenses with his speed and strength. One of Bob Stauffer’s favs.
For Montreal to have success I think they’ll want to get the Oilers hemmed in their own zone as much as possible and take away Edmonton’s ability to get the puck to their stars. Working McDavid and Draisaitl over seemed to be fruitful to some extent for the Senators, so I’d have to think that is something the Habs are mulling over as well since they have the personnel to do that.
Another tactic, that I’ll speak more to below in the Oilers key to success section, would be to get as many shots on net from the point and attempt more re-directions.
With regards to Edmonton, I’ll be watching these three individuals closely,
- #75 Evan Bouchard – Certainly looks like he’ll be staying in the lineup for the foreseeable future, eh? I wonder if, at some point, the Oilers don’t start going with four right-shot defenders? I watched Montreal go with Weber/Petry in the third period against the Leafs last night so I don’t see how the Oilers couldn’t deploy a similar-handed pairing.
- #56 Kailer Yamamoto – No goals in eight games for Yamo. He’s going to need to get it going here. Mark Spector has already started in on him, more specifically his shot (or lack of one according to Spec).
- #84 William Lagesson – Been pumping this guy’s tires for a couple of years now. I’ve always said he’s a Mattias Ekholm-lite. After a bit of a slow start, he’s stolen Caleb Jones’ job and is really finding his footing at the NHL level.
Keys to Success For the Oilers
I find that with Mike Smith and Mikko Koskinen, keeping shots to the outside might be the optimal game plan, even though times have changed and rarely do teams utilize the big point shot these days. So usually, if you’re the Oilers, you’d want to keep the shots to the outside, right? Well, Smith and Koskinen struggle to save redirections and Edmonton’s defense, for whatever reason, has trouble tying sticks up in the shooting lanes and taking away that option. With the Habs employing Shea Weber, Jeff Petry, and Alexander Romanov; they’ve got three defenders with outstanding shots and a plethora of skilled forwards that are able to tip them.
That said, you don’t want to allow their skillers the ability to get in close either. Tomas Tatar, Jonathan Drouin, Phillip Danault, Jesperi Kotkaniemi, Brendan Gallagher… The list goes on of the kind of skilled forwards the Habs have that can make life terribly difficult on your blueliners. It’s a real catch 22.
Keeping both of those points in mind, the beginning of tonight’s game will be very important for Edmonton. I imagine the Canadiens will be gung-ho from the get-go and if that’s the case and the Oilers can withstand that early pressure, they might be in a better position to win as the game wears on.
The other thing that I think is really working in Edmonton’s favor is having three defensive d-men working together. I’m talking about Darnell Nurse, William Lagesson, and Adam Larsson. A few weeks ago when these teams met, the Oilers were really pushing a defense group whose strength was puck-moving, but the problem was they had a hard time against a constant and physical forecheck that Montreal pushes.
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