Edmonton Oilers fans have never had cause to doubt Head Coach Kris Knoblauch before, but recently he has been under some scrutiny.
Edmonton is having a solid season, second in the Pacific Eivision (if only by the hair on Darnell Nurse’s head), 10th in the league. With 78 points through 64 games, they are only four points behind where they were at this point last season.
Despite that the Oilers are in something of a cold streak. While they have won two of the last three and three of the last five, they have also only won three of the last 10. This .300 pts% is a huge step down from the .609 trail that Edmonton has been blazing thus far this season.
Optimistic Oiler fans, who are a lot like optimistic farmers in that there are none, may rightly point out that they’ve won two of the last three, and therefore look to be on the way out of the cold streak. While they could be right, the more worrying fact is that Edmonton has lost to some pretty abysmal teams in this streak: Buffalo, Anaheim, Philadelphia, as well as a close shave against Montreal.
Could Knoblauch be the problem here?
Are there coaching woes?
Coach Knoblauch’s tenure with the Oilers started last year on November 12, after Jay Woodcroft was relieved of his duties. Since then it’s pretty much been all beer, no foam. The Oilers immediately turned around that train wreck of a start and never really looked back, going all the way to the Stanley Cup Final. While they didn’t win, that’s a huge accomplishment for a freshman coach. The only problem with such a hot start is that it’s hard to replicate.
While Edmonton is still having a good season, and Knoblauch is no where near being fired, there has been some questioning of the Oilers bench boss recently. Two main argument present themselves.
Questioning Knoblauch’s lineup decisions
Some questions come to mind concerning the lineup. Foremost is Jeff Skinner not being given ample opportunity, both in quality and quantity of icetime. He was brought onto the team in the offseason, carrying a lot of hope with him, at that point, only one year removed from an 82-point season.
Skinner has not been given much of an opportunity to prove himself though, at 12:27 ATOI, he rides the pine longer than any other forward who has been an Oiler all season other than Corey Perry.
It was expected that Skinner and fellow offseason acquisition Viktor Arvidsson would be the wings to make Leon Draisaitl fly. The Oilers started the season this way ever so briefly but 62 games into the season that trio has played only 45.9 minutes together, approximately equivalent to three or four games of play on a line. Not only has Skinner not been given much quality ice time but he has played on 14 different lines so far this season.
Skinner is actually fourth on the team in G/60 and P/60, and while those stats are undoubtedly suffering from a small sample size bias, I think that it warrants more ice time.
Another quick question is why haven’t we got to see more of Matt Savoie? He spent only four games with the Oilers and I know I’m not the only one who would like to see some more young, smart, talented play.
Defensive play heavily being pushed
Here’s some decidedly bland cud for you to chew on: Connor McDavid, Evan Bouchard, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Zach Hyman, Mattias Ekholm, Jeff Skinner, Viktor Arvidsson, Adam Henrique, and Ty Emberson are all having slower productive years than last year, and many of them are downright glacial compared to their career bests.
The Oilers as a team are posting the lowest GF/GP average that they have in the last five years but still the third highest GA/GP in that time.
It’s hard to point out any specific shift in gameplay that may be responsible for this, but the assumption is that Knoblauch is pushing for a more defensive game. While on the face this doesn’t sound like such a bad thing, the Oilers are an offensive team, there’s no point in denying it. With McDavid and Draisaitl on your team, that’s always going to be your specialty.
Besides which I am a strong proponent for the “the best defence is a great offence” theory, in hockey more than any other sport. If you sit back on your heels, don’t forecheck, and don’t pinch you will simply spend more time in your own end, which is a good way to get scored on.
Is it coaching or something else?
It’s very hard to say whether or not this is a coaching problem since we aren’t in the room, we don’t practice with the Oilers, and we don’t know what Knoblauch might be implementing.
The Oilers have had a 94% PDO (Sv% + SH%) these last ten games which is well down from their season 98.58%. This stat is often called puck luck because over time a team will essentially always get closer to 100%. This seems to imply that the Oilers are just in a slump, hard to point to a cause but rarely persistent.
Whatever the reason, Knoblauch or not, Knoblauch would do well to turn the team around as they rest only one point ahead of the Los Angeles Kings for second in the division.
stats from NHL.com, naturalstatrick.com, and moneypuck.com
Fire the coach. Lou Lamoriello would change coaches like changing his underwear. Part of the game. Oilers need to be ruthless in their management. Lou Lamoriello lead the Devil’s to success by being ruthless. It is what it is.
Fire the Offensive Coordinator he has not done his job since being hired.