EDMONTON — It’s one way to start a hockey game when you make a choice at your own blue line to give up a shorthanded goal at 2:42 at night.
When it turns out to be one of your best shifts of the night, well, that’s another thing entirely.
“You try this move 100 times and it only happens once or twice,” said a disappointed Evan Bouchard.
When asked what he wanted to do in the game, he said bluntly: “A lot of things. Not acceptable tonight.”
“I wouldn’t say it’s gone away from everyone,” said Bouchard, who is now completely at the mercy of the consequences. “Myself, maybe yes. So there’s definitely a lot of work to be done on that front.”
Hey, sometimes you get butch bombs, and sometimes, well, butch bombs. To his credit, he faced the media after a rough night, and he wasn’t the only one coming off a 6-5 loss to the Florida Panthers.
The 25-year-old Bouchard is a talented No. 1 defender who is so good with the ball that on nights when he plays through injury, the team doesn’t perform as well as he would like, and as they say, he plays on offense and defense. Both ends are dangerous.
The Oilers and Panthers gave us a great game in the Stanley Cup rematch on Monday night, with the Panthers scoring the final score to win 6-5.
Like his former assistant coach Paul Coffey, Bouchard’s game was littered with mistakes. He never shied away from the puck or offensive opportunity, delivering more pucks at 90 mph than almost any defenseman in the league.
“I’ve definitely seen Evan play much better than that,” said his head coach, Chris Knoblauch. “We had some other players who didn’t play their best as well. I’m not going to blame that on Evan.
“He’s obviously one of our best players and you can count on those guys. When you win games, they’re usually your best players, but they can’t be your best players every night. For Evan It was a tough night for him, but he doesn’t get that often.”
His partner, the ever-steady Mattias Ekholm, wasn’t much better. His mistake was a little more subtle.
Darnell Nurse went uncharacteristically and was deemed unsportsmanlike minor for yelling at referee Kelly Sutherland. Florida scored on that one, and Nurse later knocked down Matthew Tkachuk with a blatant elbow, a reminder of just how good Tkachuk was in the black hat during these parts.
He is hated here. But now that he’s no longer a Calgary Flames player, Tkachuk has more wins than he deserves against Edmonton.
“Obviously, disappointing,” said Connor McDavid, whose team led 4-2 in the second period. “It felt like we were in control. We had to find a way to win this game.”
Edmonton scored three goals in 3:04 in the second period, and the Panthers scored two goals in 30 seconds in the third period… This one was very interesting, and they were in Stanley It was everything that wasn’t there in the 2-1 win in Game 7 of the Cup Final. Honest.
Sportsnet’s Jack Michaels described the match so perfectly: “Fighting, but deeply flawed.” However, it could also be a sign that the Oilers, who have won five straight, are coming off a game-turning game.
The cracks in Edmonton’s fabric began to show during Saturday’s 6-3 win over Vegas. On Monday, the structure fell apart like a game of Jenga.
“There were some very serious mistakes,” Knoblauch lamented. “Whether it’s the defense not getting the puck out or a line change, those are costly mistakes that shouldn’t happen.”
The Boston Bruins visit on Thursday, ending Edmonton’s five-game stretch against good teams — Edmonton is 3-1 with wins over Tampa, Minnesota and Vegas — and now it’s time to take care of this A game that got the Oilers this far last season.
“Maybe you found something there,” began Connor Brown, who had scored in three straight games. “The success of our team over the past few years has been our defensive performance – our defensive ability. That makes you a consistent team.
“You can be cold all night and still be able to compete. You don’t want to win hockey games by filling up the net. I think we can take another step forward defensively and I believe we will.”
Hey, we spend 6-5 hours every day. Scoring 11 goals in one game is a nice break.
But it won’t make you a winner in the long run.
Edmonton has learned and relearned this lesson. You don’t have to tell anyone in the room in Edmonton.
