A funny thing happened on the way to the rout at Bridgestone Arena. The Nashville Predators won, 4-3 in overtime.
Wait… What?
It’s true. The Edmonton Oilers‘ all-time punching bag dragged this game into overtime, and then Roman Josi scored the OT winner — just the third time Nashville has beaten Edmonton in their past 20 meetings.
Nobody on Edmonton’s side loved their game.
“I thought we were too complicated. Caused too many unforced errors,” said Zach Hyman, who rammed home two pucks from the blue paint, goals No. 15 and 16 in just 28 games played this season. “It’s just a mindset. For whatever reason today, we weren’t playing as smart as we can. It just caused too many turnovers. Some led to goals, other just led to time to possession in our end.”
Realistically, the loser point is a decent result for a team that won 4-1 in Chicago the night before, and was re-inserting Jake Walman and goalie Tristan Jarry into the lineup, both coming back from lengthy injuries.
Jarry hadn’t played since Dec. 18 in Boston. He faced 27 shots and wasn’t at fault on any egregious goals, though he strayed from his crease on the OT winner and was unable to clear a puck that Josi eventually shot into Edmonton’s unattended net.
He was as good as you’d expect for a guy who hadn’t played in a month, and with Connor Ingram coming on, the Oilers could be healthier in net than they’ve been in years — providing Jarry can stay healthy.
The real fallout from Jarry’s return is the fact that Edmonton now has a decision to make among its three goaltenders.
Jarry is the incumbent No. 1, and Ingram has played his way past Calvin Pickard in the Oilers’ nets. Edmonton currently has all three goalies on its active roster, but if Ingram remains with the team beyond Saturday he will require waivers to be sent down to AHL Bakersfield. Before then, he can go down without waivers.
Oilers GM Stan Bowman will have to decide whether to farm out Ingram for a while, despite the fact that he has become the organization’s No. 2 with his game still on the rise, try to sneak Pickard through waivers, or carry all three goalies on his active roster.
That will unfold as the week goes on. In the meantime, Edmonton has still gained points in 10 straight games at Bridgestone, but they had a 3-2 lead for a scant 38 seconds in the second period and did not win.
They head home from their two-game Dads trip with a win and a loser point — and points in five straight games (3-0-2).
“We just looked like we were a step behind. They looked a lot fresher and a little faster than us,” head coach Kris Knoblauch said of the Preds. “We just wanted it to be easy.
“I don’t think they were doing anything out of the ordinary. We just made it easier on them by just trying to force plays and turn over the pucks, rather than just establishing a forecheck.”
Somehow, an Oilers team that was 12-4 in overtime games last year is just 5-5 this season.
Why? It’s all the same players that get all the same ice time in OT for Edmonton, so it’s a mystery why what worked so well for years has suddenly ceased to deliver.
The one shred of good news Tuesday, other than the point that pulled Edmonton into a tie atop the Pacific with Vegas? That would be Connor McDavid’s points streak, the longest of his career and longest in the NHL this season.
On his 29th birthday, with his father Brian in the stands, McDavid assisted on the two Hyman powerplay goals to run his streak to 20 games.
He has 19 goals, 27 assists and 45 points over the course of the streak.
Next up, the Islanders at Rogers Place on Thursday, followed by back-to-back games on the weekend: In Vancouver Saturday, and at home to the St. Louis Blues on Sunday, a tilt that is scheduled to be Ryan Nugent-Hopkins’ 1,000th career game, all in an Oilers uniform.
