Post-Game Talk: Preseason Game #9 wasn’t a very good one

[gordonhught]

I have the flu and woke from a fever dream where the Canucks beat the Oilers 6-4 on Saturday. Hopefully not true... but I'll be buying lottery tickets next week if that result turns out correct.

I wonder what would happen if the Oilers lost 6-1?

What type of dream would that be?

 

[nexttothemoon]

I wonder what would happen if the Oilers lost 6-1?

What type of dream would that be?

I assume we'd get an assortment of "it's only 2 games" mixed in with... "fire Woody & Holland and burn down the team" comments.

 

[gordonhught]

I assume we'd get an assortment of "it's only 2 games" mixed in with... "fire Woody & Holland and burn down the team" comments.

I think you are correct.

 

[Bryanbryoil]

People don’t seem to get this. Depth wins cups, not stars.

Stars win cups when they are surrounded by depth. Stars cannot win alone no matter how good they are.

 

[Soundwave]

People don’t seem to get this. Depth wins cups, not stars.

"Depth" comes from good drafting, good pro scouting (see: Vegas), and good cap management and the Oilers don't have a front office that's good at any of those things. So welp.

Apparently finding 4 guys who can play defense on the back end (like actual defense in the defensive zone) is rocket science too since Chiarelli and Holland both make it look like it's impossible to do.

This just cannot find a way to get a half way decent d-corps. It just must be impossible I guess or at least impossible for those two.

 

[The Panther]

Woodcrofts first full season the team was 7th in the league. We beat a team coming out of a rebuild twice and Calgary got cocky and imploded. He has been badly outcoached in all playoff series we have played outside the Calgary one. We beat LA twice by simply being the better team and got spanked by Vegas and Colorado. He is a good regular season coach maybe but he gets dismantled in a 7 game series.

Right, so which Oilers coach before him got better results? We have to go back 17.5 years for a superior playoff run to Woody's in his rookie-coach season.

"He gets dismantled in a 7 games series". Well, except for those three series' wins. And which Oilers' coach did better than three series wins in two years? Craig MacTavish, 17.5 years ago, and before him John Muckler in 1990. So, yeah, one coach in 33 years did better than Woodcroft. With much worse regular season results.

He maybe shouldn’t be fired but Manson should be.

Woody has one adjustment in game. Put McDrai together. That’s it. I was a massive Woodcroft fan till I watched both playoffs and a full year of him.

Some of you may not be aware that Woodcroft is not a 90-year-old man, set in his ways. It's quite possible that he is capable of learning and adapting his coaching craft. Believe it or not, he is quite probably aware that he made some coaching errors when his club lost.

 

[Soundwave]

Right, so which Oilers coach before him got better results? We have to go back 17.5 years for a superior playoff run to Woody's in his rookie-coach season.

"He gets dismantled in a 7 games series". Well, except for those three series' wins. And which Oilers' coach did better than three series wins in two years? Craig MacTavish, 17.5 years ago, and before him John Muckler in 1990. So, yeah, one coach in 33 years did better than Woodcroft. With much worse regular season results.

Some of you may not be aware that Woodcroft is not a 90-year-old man, set in his ways. It's quite possible that he is capable of learning and adapting his coaching craft. Believe it or not, he is quite probably aware that he made some coaching errors when his club lost.

As long as you don't care for D, he's fine as coach.

Unfortunately for the Oilers, you kind of need to be able to defend to go past round 2/3 in the playoffs.

His pros/cons are becoming apparent. He can coach run n' gun hockey and get sky high production from the PP and McDrai.

His downsides are the team will often come out sleepy because that's their nature and he's not really able to curtail that and they are piss poor defensively, which isn't all his fault, the Oilers blueline is just not very good. Only two actual top 4 D, neither of whom is an actual bonafied no.1 and the rest of the D are bottom pairing defensively.

 

[The Panther]

At the end of the day, I care about results.

I do not care what the Oilers' advanced stats are. I do not care what their GAA was in one isolated playoff series.

I care about wins. And the Oilers have been the 2nd best team in the NHL since Woodcroft took over. His results in the regular season and the playoffs are massively superior to any previous coach (probably going back to Muckler).

Why in the hell any Oilers' fan would want to get rid of the guy who is having more success in both regular season and playoffs than any other coach in the past 33 years is beyond me. But I know to expect nonsense and irrationality on this forum.

 

[Soundwave]

At the end of the day, I care about results.

I do not care what the Oilers' advanced stats are. I do not care what their GAA was in one isolated playoff series.

I care about wins. And the Oilers have been the 2nd best team in the NHL since Woodcroft took over. His results in the regular season and the playoffs are massively superior to any previous coach (probably going back to Muckler).

Why in the hell any Oilers' fan would want to get rid of the guy who is having more success in both regular season and playoffs than any other coach in the past 33 years is beyond me. But I know to expect nonsense and irrationality on this forum.

Because they can't win a Cup playing his loosey-goosey zero consequences, zero preparation defensive system. If you're good with regular season wins largely coming from McDavid, Draisaitl going on scoring tears and scoring at Gretzy like paces, sure, great.

Depends on what the expectation is.

Pretty sure if you gave Mac T circa 2007 a guy who could score 60+ goals and 150 points and then also gave him another guy who can score 50 goals and 120+ points, Mac T would look like a genius too.

 

[Behind Enemy Lines]

Not a big PK fan ... but he ain't wrong.

 

[harpoon]

At the end of the day, these teams will regress exactly where they are supposed to. Canucks with 92 points in 9th, and us 2nd in the divison playing LA in the first round.

No troll .. I don’t see why VCR can’t make the playoffs. I feel like they have a lot more players over there than they are getting credit for (on this board and also by the pofesaional prognosticators).

 

[CycloneSweep]

Right, so which Oilers coach before him got better results? We have to go back 17.5 years for a superior playoff run to Woody's in his rookie-coach season.

"He gets dismantled in a 7 games series". Well, except for those three series' wins. And which Oilers' coach did better than three series wins in two years? Craig MacTavish, 17.5 years ago, and before him John Muckler in 1990. So, yeah, one coach in 33 years did better than Woodcroft. With much worse regular season results.

Some of you may not be aware that Woodcroft is not a 90-year-old man, set in his ways. It's quite possible that he is capable of learning and adapting his coaching craft. Believe it or not, he is quite probably aware that he made some coaching errors when his club lost.

Woodcroft has the best roster the Oilers have had since the 90s

 

[harpoon]

New system the roster that you have already decided on needs to learn? Gotta get Brad Malone playing time and have guys compete for spots that don't actually exist.

Yup. There’s been a lot of complaining about Woodcroft supposedly not using the pre-season correctly. I haven’t really been on board with that because I tend to assume that pro players know most of what is going on and am more worried about an injury to an important guy during a meaningless game. But you’re absolutely right to say that if the starters don’t know how to play the system then they should have been practicing that in pre-season.

But still .. I don’t buy the idea that players were ‘too confused’ to play their positions correctly. If you’ve been playing hockey for twenty years and made it to the NHL I find it pretty unlikely that you are going to stand there and watch a guy take free shots from the side of the net because ‘that’s not my man, coach said to stand here’.

Im talking specifically about Bouchard, Nurse and Kulak. These guys are just bad at defending. They are good skaters with good offensive instincts but severely limited when it comes to making reasonable defensive reads. Oilers have a bag full of players like that. It’s a big problem.

tldr - I don’t think it’s the system as much as it is the players.

 

[CycloneSweep]

Yup. There’s been a lot of complaining about Woodcroft supposedly not using the pre-season correctly. I haven’t really been on board with that because I tend to assume that pro players know most of what is going on and am more worried about an injury to an important guy during a meaningless game. But you’re absolutely right to say that if the starters don’t know how to play the system then they should have been practicing that in pre-season.

But still .. I don’t buy the idea that players were ‘too confused’ to play their positions correctly. If you’ve been playing hockey for twenty years and made it to the NHL I find it pretty unlikely that you are going to stand there and watch a guy take free shots from the side of the net because ‘that’s not my man, coach said to stand here’.

Im talking specifically about Bouchard, Nurse and Kulak. These guys are just bad at defending. They are good skaters with good offensive instincts but severely limited when it comes to making reasonable defensive reads. Oilers have a bag full of players like that. It’s a big problem.

tldr - I don’t think it’s the system as much as it is the players.

It’s players partly. Nurse is a notorious slow learner, so it would have been lovely to actually set him and the other players up for success after they change the entirely d system up. But instead guys who will never play in the league getting ice time wasting the preseason and the boys look like they don’t know what’s going on.

 

[Oilhawks]

Not a big PK fan ... but he ain't wrong.

And when “No Defense” PK is calling out your team for playing poor defense, you know it’s bad

 

[TheNumber4]

Not a big PK fan ... but he ain't wrong.

I’m okay with this take cause it’s genuine and accurate. If it came from an Oilers hater like Biz I’d view it as just a troll job though.

 

[Oilhawks]

No troll .. I don’t see why VCR can’t make the playoffs. I feel like they have a lot more players over there than they are getting credit for (on this board and also by the pofesaional prognosticators).

I watched a lot more Canucks hockey last year than I would have liked. It was ugly. It was like an Oilers lite for forwards, worse D but much better goaltending. If they overwork Demko they could make the playoffs, but doubt they go anywhere unless he runs hot a bit like in the bubble. The additions they made aren’t enough, IMO.

 

[guymez]

No troll .. I don’t see why VCR can’t make the playoffs. I feel like they have a lot more players over there than they are getting credit for (on this board and also by the pofesaional prognosticators).

They have some nice pieces but its their system that is the difference maker.
Tochett had 100% buy in from his players against the Oilers.
They play that system with that level of commitment over the entirety of the season and they are going to catch a lot of teams off guard.

 

[booyakasha]

LOL, posters still railing about the game, with some garbage knee jerk takes?
it's over, let's move on to the next game.....every team gets a shellacking, even championship teams.

 

[joestevens29]

LOL, posters still railing about the game, with some garbage knee jerk takes?
it's over, let's move on to the next game.....every team gets a shellacking, even championship teams.

Well by the Nucks who were battling the flu makes it that much worse.

I agree it's just one game. However, they are showing the same type of weakness that has hurt them in the past. Listened/read quite a few people's takes on the game from trusted media personnel. And the biggest thing is once again this isn't a one player is going to fix it all. This team has been plagued by team defense for far too many years. Which is funny because all those years where we lacked fire power we had a team that was committed to playing team defense because they had no other choice. This team still has the mentality that they can out score their defensive issues and until that changes we won't be a championship team.

I also don't know that championship teams lose by 7

 

[nabob]

That EP40 hit was nice…but why are none of the media outlets talking about how blatant of a charge it was?

Well by the Nucks who were battling the flu makes it that much worse.

I agree it's just one game. However, they are showing the same type of weakness that has hurt them in the past. Listened/read quite a few people's takes on the game from trusted media personnel. And the biggest thing is once again this isn't a one player is going to fix it all. This team has been plagued by team defense for far too many years. Which is funny because all those years where we lacked fire power we had a team that was committed to playing team defense because they had no other choice. This team still has the mentality that they can out score their defensive issues and until that changes we won't be a championship team.

I also don't know that championship teams lose by 7

It was one game.

 

[joestevens29]

That EP40 hit was nice…but why are none of the media outlets talking about how blatant of a charge it was?


It was one game.

I get it, but same old team.

Even them winning 8-1 on Saturday isn't going to get me thinking "oh wow here's a team that changed from last year"

The Oilers needed to prove themselves over a long stretch

 

[WaitingForUser]

I get it, but same old team.

Even them winning 8-1 on Saturday isn't going to get me thinking "oh wow here's a team that changed from last year"

The Oilers needed to prove themselves over a long stretch

And it’s one game so how that disproving themselves?

 

[CupofOil]

7th.

And 2nd after Ekholm came aboard.

The sky is still in tact in Oil Country guys.

Well they aren’t that team anymore though. We lost a bunch to depth from that.

They lost Yamamoto, Kostin and Bgujstad and brought in Brown and Holloway.

The sky hasn't fallen Cyclone

 

[FlameChampion]

I watched a lot more Canucks hockey last year than I would have liked. It was ugly. It was like an Oilers lite for forwards, worse D but much better goaltending. If they overwork Demko they could make the playoffs, but doubt they go anywhere unless he runs hot a bit like in the bubble. The additions they made aren’t enough, IMO.

I think they have improved but its going to be tough going for them. They have a pretty good forward group. I think Hronek and Soucy will help on the back end. But really its all about Demko. I think hes the best goalie in the pacific when hes healthy. Having a healthy Demko gives them a shot at the wildcard. The other thing that helps is that the west isnt super strong (mainly the Central). Basically the Flames, Canucks, Kraken and Jets are probably battling for 2 wildcard spots.