Edmonton Oilers Pregame Thoughts

I hope every fan in Oil Country, as well as all the other fanbases, enjoyed the Christmas break and time off from hockey viewing.

It’s rare for this team to enter the holidays with their current record. Given how the Oilers tend to operate on the ice, they’re either barely hanging on a Playoff spot due to a massive slump, or outside of a spot entirely. And with some of the opponents they’ve had this month, some fans would’ve been fine with roughly a .500 record with one or two overtime losses. Being 8-2 in December so far is a generous change from their slow start. They’d have even sat at nine straight wins before Christmas Eve had they not played a stinker against the Panthers. Maybe that, and perhaps not making a costly mistake in their December 3rd game, which was just a 1-0 score, we could’ve seen 13 wins in a row because that loss ended a three-game winning streak. But there’s no pressure to have that sort of streak like there was last season. We sometimes like to overreact as if they’re in a bad place, but they’re really not.

They got goalie-d for the majority of one game, but stuck with it and still found a way to win. The game before that, they erased an early 2 goal deficit and found a way to win. The Oilers are a good team; they’ve proven to be more than good enough when they don’t have their annual one-month mental break. We can now forgive some of their on-ice gaffes with their position in the standings. They’re also always better at the second half of a season, so we know their absolute best is still yet to come.

Losing once in a blue moon won’t be a sign of the apocalypse, not even twice. It’s going to happen sometime in a span of 7 months before the postseason, where the more intense hockey begins. I’m looking forward to the remaining 48 games, and so should you. Let’s start talking about one of them now. The keys to the game are…

Big Points: My first paragraph was about looking good in the division, and we return to action against a division rival. L.A. is only one point behind Edmonton in the standings. Our team would remain in second place with an OT loss, but a three-point lead on the third-place team would be a tad healthier.

Kuemp-ing Out: After finishing last season with an .890 SV% in 33 games last season, Darcy Kuemper is enjoying a bounce back as the #1 netminder for the Kings with a .911SV% in 16 games thus far. With his team ranked 3^rd in GA/G and 11^th on the PK, it’s like they say; your best defender and penalty killer is your goalie.

Old Friends: Viktor Arvidsson for the Oilers and Warren Foegele for the Kings should each be fired up for a match-up against their former teams. Arvidsson started the season struggling to produce the offense that was expected out of him. He’s played three games since coming back from injury and is coming off a big night against the Senators, where he put up a goal and an assist playing on the top line while Ryan Nugent-Hopkins was out with an illness. Foegele is on pace for a career season with his new club, 18 points in 34 games so far. He opened up about what he learned from playing with Leon Draisaitl, such as how to be more patient when looking for plays in the offensive zone. Which side will have an ex-teammate shine?