Edmonton Oilers: After Thirty Games

As it appears today, the Edmonton Oilers are firmly positioned to make the playoffs this season. Barring injury to key players or the goaltending hitting the skids, it looks like Connor McDavid and company will be making their second appearance in the post-season in four years.

This has to excite Oilers fans all around the globe! Here’s something else that is getting them riled up, just not in a good way…

MIN, DET, LAK, CHI, OTT are a combined -111 in goal differential.

The Oilers are 0-5 against them.

— Phil Landry (@elksherd) December 5, 2019

Now, if these are the teams Edmonton spends its time losing to, I’m not going to get too bent out of shape. They’ve done pretty well bouncing back from poor showings this year. I’m hoping that they’ll spend the rest of the season beating the league’s best because when they make the playoffs, guess who they’ll be playing? That said, it’s not really the kind of habit you’d like your team to be getting into.

We’re thirty games into the 2019/20 campaign and nearly half-way through this 8-part series. The reason I’m doing it this year is just to track how the team plays throughout the year to see where they progress and where they regress every ten games. You can check out how they did in their first ten games right here and their second ten games here.

What you’re going to notice is I’ve taken out some of the numbers from last time that indicated the difference between the first ten games and the second. I simply haven’t the time to add that little detail in at this moment. What I did do to help compensate is added a number in brackets that is either red or green. That indicates whether the Oilers improved or regressed based on the league standings for that particular metric.

Record: 17-10-3 (6th)

There’s a lot of talk about who the Oilers should go after with regards to the trade deadline recently. Taylor Hall, JG Pageau, Andreas Athanasiou, Chris Kreider, etc. have all been named by pundits over the previous week. I think they should address two things if or when Ken Holland decides to pull the trigger on a trade, shooters and faceoff specialists.

The Edmonton Sun’s Jim Matheson was musing in Edmonton’s game against the Senators that Tyler Ennis might be a player who would help the Oilers. He might, but I have a feeling that playoff hockey’s defensive nature would shut down such a player. What about Chris Tierney though? He’s only 25 years old, had 48pts last year and is over 55% on the faceoff dot (5×5) this year. He’s a lefty though and I reckon the Oilers would still like to add a right-handed center.

I maintain that DET’s Luke Glendening is a player that the Oilers should target for nothing more than depth. He’s a 4th line center that will not add anything offensively, but he’s so damned good on the draw and he’s a righty. At 5×5 he’s winning faceoffs at a 57% clip this year and Detroit is reliving the days when they first drafted they guy that is their GM right now. They’re just horrible and Edmonton should find a way to take advantage.

As for shooters, generally, you’d like a guy who puts the puck in the net more often than not, but just having players on the team who have a shoot-first mentality could cause some havoc if he’s playing with the right linemates.

Are the Oilers being instructed not to shoot at every opportunity? It’s not as if they have a bunch of Brendan Gallaghers or Chris Kreiders to crash the net, right? So would shooting in volume be more or less the equivalent of a giveaway? That’s something to ponder.

Nashville’s slumping sniper, Craig Smith is another player the Oilers should have interest in. He’s had four 20-goal seasons in his last five years but this year he’s scored only two goals in 27 games while having a 5×5 shots/60 of 10.94… His sh% at 5×5 is 3.70%. The guy is shooting but it’s just not going in. The 30-year-old is on the final year of a contract that is paying him $4.25M/yr.

Cheaper players (via salary or acquisition cost) who’ve been known to be shooters are Brandon Pirri (VGK), Miles Wood (NJ), Tyler Toffoli (LA), Ilya Kovalchuk (LAK), and Josh Anderson (CBJ).

Their secondary scoring, as illustrated above, is still severely lacking and so, the bottom line is if the Oilers want to make a go of this, they’re going to have to get creative with the trades due to salary cap constraints.

The above stats are courtesy of NHL.com.

These metrics aren’t really an indication of success or failure per se. Although, it doesn’t hurt to be amongst the league leaders in all of them aside from giveaways and missed shots I suppose. The hits tailed off a bit and I would think that’s due to not having Josh Archibald, Adam Larsson, Joakim Nygard, and Zack Kassian in the lineup. Expect those to rise in the next ten-game block should those gentlemen stay healthy.

The Fancies (5×5)

If any of these metrics are unfamiliar to you, please consult the Natural Stat Trick Glossary.

This team is still not quite hitting the mark from an advanced analytics point of view. Should we be concerned? I think it’s debatable. The PDO tells us that this team is pretty true to what it’s going to be. I don’t like how Edmonton tanked in goals for and scoring chances goals for percentage. That’s telling me that these boys aren’t taking advantage of the opportunities given to them. Has that to do with confidence, skill, or both and does it need to be addressed?

I don’t believe that this team is going to all of a sudden become possession kings this year. We’re seeing an honest representation of this club and as good as they are playing, they seem to be getting propped up by amazing special teams, average goaltending, and two elite superstars. To a lesser degree, I’d say the emergence or Ethan Bear as a viable second-pair defender has helped immensely. If he goes down or starts slumping, there will be trouble.

The Next Ten Games (31-40)

• vs. LA Kings (11-16-2) – A pissed off Oilers team will make short order of the Kings in this rubber match. (WIN)
• vs. Buffalo Sabres (13-10-5) – No Dahlin for Buffalo but Jack Eichel is on a tear. Captain Jack will get his points but his team will not. (WIN)
• vs. Carolina Hurricanes (16-11-1) – Carolina is too deep for this Oilers team plus Andrei Svechnikov is making a mockery of the NHL as a 19-year-old. (LOSS)
• @ Minnesota Wild (13-11-4) – The Oilers seem to have trouble against teams like this for whatever reason. Immaturity in the club maybe? (LOSS)
• vs. Toronto Maple Leafs (13-13-4) – The Leafs defense is soft like a Wendy’s Frosty but they’ve got the kind of offense that could really tear open the Oilers. It’s a toss-up for me but I’ll say Edmonton takes it. (WIN)
• @ Dallas Stars (15-11-3) – Tough match-up for Edmonton here. Dallas already beat them once this year but that was when they were struggling. Now that they’re playing well, will the Oilers’ mindset going into this one be different? (WIN)
• @ St. Louis Blues (18-6-6) – Edmonton’s been performing very well against the league’s top teams. I don’t expect that to stop in St. Louis. (WIN)
• vs. Pittsburgh Penguins (15-9-4) – The first game of a back-to-back at home and the Oilers are one up on Crosby’s Pens. Pittsburgh is going through one hell of an injury crisis mind you but as we’ve seen, the Oilers have failed to take advantage of these situations in the past. (LOSS)
• vs. Montreal Canadiens (12-10-6) – I feel like the Habs usually give Edmonton a hard time when they come to town and their team is a lot better than their record tells us. (LOSS)
• @ Vancouver Canucks (14-11-4) – I like the Oilers chances against Vancouver here and it’s the last game before the Christmas break. (WIN)

(Standings as of December 5th, 2019)

Can the Oilers go 6-4-0 in this next ten-game stretch? It’s possible, but if I’m being completely honest, I think my predictions are a tad optimistic. What do you think? Let us know in the comments below!