EDMONTON — The deal with goaltender Mike Smith is you can’t just pay attention to his puck handling when it goes bad — like on Monday when he skated out to stop a puck, it hopped over his stick into the area that forbids him to play the puck, and as he scrambled back to his cage the Flames scored.
Watch the game tonight — an 10:00 p.m. ET/8:00 p.m. MT start against the Calgary Flames — and count how many times his puck handling starts a clean breakout that gets the Oilers going north. If he doesn’t play all those pucks, and with such a high level of success, how many eventually turn into goals against?
That’s a subjective question, I know. But we did ask Smith what he does when his roaming goes awry, like it did on Monday.
“Move on,” he answered. “It’s over and done and there’s nothing you can do about it. Have a short memory and get back out there and play it again.
“As much as I’m out there playing it, from time to time it’s going to take a weird bounce like it did (Monday). It ended up in the back of the net, which you never like to give up those goals. But you have to get back out there and continue to do what I think has given our team some relief back there.”
One dynamic that exacerbates a bad bounce like the one on Monday is this: When Smith goes out to play a puck, his two defencemen spread out and get away from him, becoming open targets for his pass. When trouble arises, however, they’re in no position to help out.
“It is what it is,” Smith shrugged. “It goes in an area I can’t play it in. You either take a penalty or you try and do what you can to get back in the net.
“It’s not going to stop me from doing what I do. It’s a big part of my game, and something every defencemen that I’ve played with enjoys. I’m not going to stop because one goal goes in.”
Lines
The Flames have won three straight under new coach Darryl Sutter, so we’re not expecting any changes. They lined up like this on Monday:
Tkachuk, Lindholm, Dube
Gaudreau, Monahan, Ritchie
Lucic, Backlund, Mangiapane
Bennett, Ryan, Leivo
Giordano, Andersson
Hanifin, Tanev
Valimaki, Kylington
Markstrom
As for the Oilers, it’s a huge guessing game.
Jujhar Khaira (concussion) won’t play, and Kyle Turris can not replace him as he is just coming off the COVID list. He’s not ready yet.
Head coach Dave Tippett said Zack Kassian (broken hand) required clearance to play, and we will assume he is in if he gets cleared. All those injuries will determine if Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl remain on a line together, or if they centre their own lines.
On defence, Tippett inferred that Tyson Barrie is questionable, and said that Evan Bouchard would draw in if Barrie can’t go. Here are some plausible lines, but watch warm-ups to see who is in and who is out.
Draisaitl, McDavid, Yamamoto
Ennis, Nugent-Hopkins, Puljujarvi
Kahun, Shore, Archibald
Chiasson, Haas, Kassian
Nurse, Bouchard
Lagesson, Larsson
Russell, Bear
Smith
NHL Newsletter
Getting To Know You
Darryl Sutter’s greatest asset as a coach, we’ve always heard, is dealing with his players one on one. The real skill is in giving them assignments they can succeed at, pushing them to get there, and then everyone reaps the spoils of confident players who do their job within the team.
Some players don’t like his style, sure. But I’ve never met a player who didn’t like to win, and that is part of Sutter’s resumé as well.
Where does that ability to bond with players come from?
“Coming from a big family of brothers. Being the same age, and stickin’ together. Talking and walking yourself through, that’s ingrained in us. It’s natural,” Sutter said. “Going back in my career as a player, I had two totally opposite types of coaches. One was Bob Pullford, the big, gruff guy who taught you to play as five and check. And then I had Roger Neilson, Pully’s assistant coach in Chicago, who taught me not only the X and O and the technical parts of it, but the relationship part of it.”
We’ll see long the Flames enjoy this bump that a coaching change inevitably provides. But for a coach that’s been around for a week, he’s made huge headway with a lot of players.
Shouldn’t it take longer?
“We don’t have time for that,” he said. “It should take longer, but the one advantage I have is that I am pretty familiar with the staff. Not only the coaches but trainers and management. And the most part is the players. I know Mikael Backlund, I know Gio (Mark Giordano), I know Looch (Milan Lucic). Three pretty important guys in the locker room.”
Bear Facts
Ethan Bear’s season has been a struggle.
He started slow, and just as Bear got up to speed he took a puck to the head while sitting on the Oilers bench. He had to start all over again and is still working his way back. It hasn’t always been pretty, like that ill-advised pinch on the game-winning goal by Noah Hanifin on Monday.
“Lately he’s been better,” Tippett said, somewhat generously. “He’s a player we need to get up and going. He needs to play quality minutes for us.”
Tippett seems like he’s going to stick with his second-pairing D-man until he works his way back up to last year’s level of play, when Bear was very good and led all rookie defencemen in ice time.
“If we didn’t know that it was in him, then you’d second guess it. But he showed last year he can be a really solid, right-side D,” Tippett said. “He’s kind of a ’tweener — he can move the puck but can defend well, and he’s a good penalty killer.
“He’s had some ups and downs this year, and we’re trying to push him into the areas where he can get back up to his top level. If he does that, he can really help our team,” his coach said. “He’s a smart player, and he’s had some ups and downs this year getting up to speed.”
