EDMONTON — The consensus pick as the eventual Stanley Cup champion by predictors across the National Hockey League only a month ago, absolutely nobody saw what is unfolding here in Edmonton.
The Oilers lost again on Saturday, a dispirited, soft and defenceless 5-2 loss to Nashville, and sit at 2-7-1 after 10 games of the 2023-24 season.
A playoff miss is very much in the cards, and as such, everything is on the table in Edmonton. That includes firing head coach Jay Woodcroft, whose non-competitive, lackadaisical team looks exactly like the one that got Dave Tippett fired, and Todd McLellan before him.
“I thought we lost a lot of puck battles today. Didn’t like seeing that,” assessed Woodcroft after the game. “We gave up a couple goals that were specifically right at the net. Not a good sign for us. That’s an area that we have to control a lot better.”
Those two goals comprised two-thirds of a Ryan O’Reilly hat trick, as he twice out-muscled Edmonton’s top defenceman, Darnell Nurse. It was a metaphor for a team whose best players haven’t been their best players at all, and on Saturday, O’Reilly took Nurse to school.
If there is one area where Edmonton’s top defenceman can earn some of that $9.25 million, it is his net-front presence, but he just couldn’t handle the veteran O’Reilly, costing his team two even-strength goals.
A supposedly desperate Oilers club failed to score an even-strength goal. Leon Draisaitl extended his goal-less streak to seven games, while Connor McDavid hasn’t scored in five.
McDavid’s frustration was written all over his face post-game, the captain of a ship that’s taking on water faster than the crew can bail.
“The mental mistakes that keep costing us over and over again made us chase the game,” said McDavid. “It is just death by a thousand cuts, that is what it feels like. One mistake and it costs us, and another little mistake and it just snowballs. It is tough to chase games.”
Both McDavid’s and Draisaitl’s offensive games are off, and their defensive games are poor. The Predators’ top line outscored the Oilers unit of McDavid, Draisaitl and Zach Hyman by four even-strength goals to one power-play marker by Hyman.
“Our struggles are all over the rink,” McDavid observed. “That is what you get when you are 2-7-1. There seem to be struggles all over the ice.”
That includes behind the bench, where Woodcroft and his staff are flummoxed.
The mistakes being made in Game 10 of the season replicate the ones committed in Game 1, an 8-1 drubbing in Vancouver that turns out to be quite a portent, though at the time it was cavalierly written off as one bad night.
This is a good roster, but it’s a bad team. That’s what gets coaches fired, and with only eight games remaining before American Thanksgiving, it might be a case of, if you wait too long, it won’t matter anymore.
“The only way forward is to stick together. So, that’s No. 1: stick together and work your way through it,” Woodcroft said. “But it’s about addressing parts of the game that have to be cleaned up. Right now, it has to be on the defensive side of things, not on the offensive side.”
Edmonton is allowing over four goals per game through the opening 10-game segment. It is a reflection of a group of skaters with insufficient attention to defensive detail, a top-heavy lineup and bottom-tier goaltending.
He let in five more Saturday, and after a disastrous season a year ago, Campbell’s solid training camp is long in the rearview mirror. No player has said it specifically, but this reporter senses that these professional players know what they see, and have turned the page on any hopes that Campbell can help an NHL team anymore.
Great guy? Sure.
Great goalie? Nope.
“Jack’s wearing the same jersey as the rest of us. As I said, I thought our group underperformed today,” said Woodcroft, when asked about Campbell. “No finger pointing here. We understand that we’ve underperformed. We can play better. We know it, and we’re going to work until we find the answer.”
Well, someone had better find an answer. Or it’s going to be a long, irrelevant winter in Northern Alberta.