EDMONTON — As the season begins, the hockey world has its sights set on edmonton oilers Blue Line thought, “Oh, boy…”
The Oilers lost three players from their Stanley Cup defense — Cody Cece, Filip Broberg and Vincent Desharnais — who weren’t all initially available. Like – Stan Bowman replaced them with journeymen Troy ScheerTravis Dermott and Josh Brown, and a kid named Ty Emberson who has played in 30 NHL games.
We can all agree that the best this blueline can dream of is giving the Oilers a trade deadline where they can add a defenseman or two for the playoffs. And there’s a good chance the team won’t be able to get them to the parade.
The Vegas Golden Knights are in town today for a crucial Saturday game, and the Oilers allow the eighth-most goals per game in the NHL. Their team defense, goaltending and inconsistent backfield combined to have the second-lowest goals-against total in the NHL over the past month.
“Since I’ve been here,” begins Matthias Ekholm“, “This is the power of this D Corps. We really don’t hear a lot of noise, whether it’s coming from outside the seven of us, outside the room, or whatever. “
There’s a lot going on within this team these days, and Evan Bouchard was listed as “game-time” by head coach Chris Knoblauch after Minnesota was hit by Ryan Hartman on Thursday. decision,” and Dermott lost to the Wild on waivers Friday and was replaced by a castaway named Alec Regula.
The top pairing of Ekholm and Bouchard performed well after a slow start, and that reflected the performance of the rest of the team. But here’s the panel below, made up of Darnell Nurse and Brett Earlwhich has made up for most of the shortcomings.
Scheer has been quietly efficient, but Emberson – who has now played just 57 NHL games – has been the biggest surprise.
Those four guards — Nurse, Kulak, Scheer and Eberson — have all performed better than expected through the first third of the season. As this top pair has found its way into the game, it’s frankly an effective defense that performs at a higher level than anyone outside of the Oilers locker room gave it credit for.
“Chris (head coach Knoblauch) was a big contributor, and a big, big reason was Paul Coffey,” Ekholm said. “He did a great job of making us a tight-knit group and making it exciting to come to the rink every day. He also pushed us to make plays and be a part of the offense. Rather than just stand there and knock the puck away ”
While we were all talking about how this D-corps could survive until the trade deadline, the one prediction no one made was that Nurse would find the game he’s been looking for for years. The 29-year-old has never played better, moving the puck reliably, skating like a horse, defending responsibly and playing with an edge that has disappeared over the years.
He played 208 minutes alongside Scheer and 138 minutes alongside Kulak.
Kulak is widely regarded as no better than a third pair player, and his ability to consistently eat up time in the top 4 is another reason why this blueline is so good.
“I refuse to put a player in a box and tell myself, ‘This is what he can do,'” Coffey said Friday. “It’s about their commitment, wanting to be taught, wanting to challenge themselves.
“Like I always say to (Kulak): ‘I don’t know how a guy can skate that well and not do better than you. Let’s go.'”
“Push ’em, push ’em, push ’em.”
Coffey knew that if this D-corps was going to survive, he would need these two veterans, who had played nearly 1,200 games and appeared in three Stanley Cup Finals, to step up their game.
“I said that to Nurse and Cooley at the beginning of the year,” Coffey said. “I’m going to start giving you more, but it comes at a cost. I’m not going to give you ice time just because I give you ice time. You have to play.
“You have to prove to me that you can play.”
They’ve reciprocated, and while Bowman was still expected to bring in a defenseman before the deadline, his options have now changed.
Will he bring in an offensive guard to play alongside a solid Nurse corps? Will he join Nurse on Kulak full-time on the offside and find a reliable, stay-at-home penalty killer for the third pair?
Does he need a second person now? Or a guard and a depth center, maybe?
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The fact that this blue line exceeded expectations no matter what he did put the Oilers back into serious Stanley Cup contention. Since Knoblauch was hired on Nov. 12, 2023, the Oilers have the third-best winning percentage (.679) in the NHL and the fifth-best goals-against average (2.71).
They found their groove in a win over Minnesota-Tampa and are now 8-2-0 in their last 10 games.
“We need guys to step up,” Ekholm said. “We may not have the flashiest names in the backcourt, but I think we do a really good job of playing to our abilities and trying to give this team a chance to win every time. night.”
They’re better than most people think, I’ll give him that.
