A 4–3 overtime loss may not be what Edmonton Oilers fans wanted from last nights game, but it was a doozie of a contest, filled to the brim with big saves, back and forth action, and fast paced plays. It was a mixed affair as no team led by more than one goal at any point in the game.
Zach Hyman plotted two blue collar power play goals from his office, six inches in front of the goalie. It was business as usual for Leon Draisaitl as well as he pounded a one-timer home on a nice dish from Kasperi Kapanen. For my part, I thought Edmonton controlled most of the game and that they would pull away as the game went on, but to their credit the Nashville Predators stuck around like the leftovers you were avoiding and hoping your siblings would eat and come Wednesday your Mom made you eat them anyways.
Goals from Steven Stamkos and Erik Haula, and a brace, including the OT winner, from Roman Josi pushed the Predators over the edge.
Here are the stories of the game:
Has Draisaitl found his linemates?
It’s fair to say that Draisaitl and Vasily Podkolzin work well together, and that Kris Knoblauch thinks so as well since Podkolzin is Draisaitl’s most common linemate by far this year. Who should sit on Draisaitl’s other wing has been an ongoing question though.
Matt Savoie, Jack Roslovic, and Andrew Mangiapane have all spent significant time with Draisaitl and Podkolzin, each with fairly reasonable success. Savoie played with the two for over 100 minutes with spectacular results, an 85.7 GF%, good enough that isn’t sustainable. My memory is more vacuous than swiss cheese, but this line was likely separated in an effort to shake things up when the Oilers were struggling earlier in the season. I would still love to see that line reunited.
Inserting Roslovic on that line proved to be solid, but not outstanding, posting a 53.3 GF%. With Mangiapane the line was exactly even, a 50 GF%.
Kapanen has extracted the second best results from Draisaitl and Podkolzin with a 70 GF%, albeit with a small sample size. It would be a lot to expect these results to continue but the stats, as they say, are only half the picture. When it comes to hockey, it’s probably more like 25%. Kapanen has looked great on that line, his speed and great work ethic mesh well with the other two and the goal tonight is a perfect example. Podkolzin and Kapanen force a turnover and Kapanen makes a smart pass to Draisaitl, who reacted quickly to the turnover and got in position.
What I want to see now is for Knoblauch to leave them be for a while so they can build some chemistry.
20-game point streak for McDavid
The Oilers didn’t come away with a win on Connor McDavid’s birthday, which is what we all know he really wants but he did extend his point streak to 20 games with two assists. McDavid has an astounding 46 points on this streak, an absurd 218 point pace.
By the way, Wayne Gretzky’s career high is 215 points so he basically kept that same pace up over an entire season. Gretzky also holds the longest ever point streak at 51 games, in which he scored 153 points. The career high and streak years WERE NOT the same year. What is up with that???
McDavid becomes only the fourth active player to hit the 20-game mark. Patty Kane did it twice and got to 26, Sidney Crosby got to 25, and Mitch Marner made it to 23. None of those guys scored at quite the rate McDavid has though. How far do you think McDavid takes this streak?
Return of Walman and Jarry
Last night also marked the return of Jake Walman and Tristan Jarry from the injured reserve. Walman has been out for a month with a lower-body injury and Jarry only missed a week, also with a lower-body injury.
Walman didn’t present much target for criticism or praise, which as a defenceman isn’t such a bad thing. Better to be innocent of defensive mistakes than guilty of offensive accolades, although both wouldn’t be such a bad thing either.
Tristan Jarry’s performance was the polar opposite of Walman’s. In general he played a terrific game, keeping Edmonton in the game with some incredible saves when they needed it. As well as stretching his pad out in desperation to catch a rebound for one of the nicest saves you will see this year.
Unfortunately, Jarry was also five feet out of his net when the over time goal was scored. That being said, challenging Josi for that wayward puck was the right play in my opinion, he just needed to commit a little more. In general I was happy with his performance, if he can play like that every night the Oilers will win a lot of hockey games.
The Oilers will be back at home tomorrow night against the sneaky good New York Islanders.
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