Oilers GM Holland: 'We're in the winning business and we weren't winning enough'

TORONTO — The Edmonton Oilers have dug the kind of hole that’s going to take a while to crawl out of.

Edmonton did take a step in the right direction on Monday night when it defeated the visiting New York Islanders 4-1 to mark the first "W" in the career of new coach Kris Knoblauch.

But if the Oilers are going to make the long climb back into the playoff picture, this win — along with the victory they got Saturday night in Seattle in what turned out to be former coach Jay Woodcroft’s final game — will have to signal the start of a serious winning stretch.

Oilers GM Ken Holland spoke in Toronto early Tuesday afternoon following the NHL’s Hall of Fame weekend and the league’s general managers meeting downtown Tuesday morning.

“I watched it on TV last night,” he said of the game that saw Edmonton surrender the first goal to New York just 40 seconds into the evening, but rebound to net three third-period tallies. “Good win. We need to win a few games to kind of get everybody feeling good about themselves.”

Yes, when a team starts the year with just two wins in a dozen tries, it takes a lot to get things back on the rails. It seemed like Saturday’s triumph in Seattle may have been a job-saving — or at least job-extending — result for Woodcroft.

Instead, Holland and Jeff Jackson — who was hired in the summer as Edmonton’s new CEO of hockey operations — made the call to let Woodcroft go despite his .643 points percentage in 133 games behind the bench. Assistant coach Dave Manson was also fired.

Holland said Knoblauch’s first win was obviously a welcomed development, but acknowledged there’s still some processing going on.

“Everybody feels terrible about what happened to Woody and to Dave Manson,” Holland said. “But obviously we're in the winning business and we weren't winning enough.”

Edmonton gets its next shot at victory when the Kraken visit town on Wednesday.