Week of November 7, 2007, Issue #629
FRONT
In The Box
Dave Young and TB Player / inthebox@vueweekly.com
Last week was lean for the Oilers, with only two games and not a win between them. A home game on Nov 2 versus Nashville left the Oilers with a 4-1 loss and another injured d-man. The annual Oiler Canadian Finals Rodeo road trip started off with a 5-2 loss in Minnesota. Can this four-game rodeo trip leave the team’s record smelling better than a post-CFR hockey arena? Yee-haw anyone?Shootout at the OK Corral With only five wins in 15 games the Oil find themselves in the basement. They’re last in the West. Numero, uh, fifteen-o. The penalty kill is decent enough (15th in the NHL) but the powerplay is dead last. With a success rate of 6.7 per cent, it may become a viable option to just start declining penalties. But there is one domain where the Oilers are looking good: the shootout. When going to the shootout, the Oil are three-for-three; best in the league. The bad news is that they’ve only managed to win outright in regulation time twice and even coming close to tying has been a seldom-seen occurrence. TB
Another Go-Round This is the annual Oiler CFR road trip. As the building is booked up yearly for the annual bronc and cowboy event the team heads off to the sunset and lets the ropers take over, horse poo and all. Traditionally this road trip is a fruitful one. Since the 1998-99 season, the Oiler record during this mid-November road swing is 20 wins, 14 losses, three ties (remember them?) and one overtime loss. Not bad for away games. Last week’s Monday night loss to Minnesota also marked the first time the Oilers were beaten by the Wild during this particular CFR-related road trip. The Oilers were 4-0 in CFR road games against the Wild up until this past 5-2 drubbing. DY
Down-Home Boys Edmonton is leading the NHL in one other stat as well. When it comes to places of birth, no city, Canadian or otherwise, has more products playing in the NHL than Edmonton. Twenty-two players who currently make their living playing in the bigs breathed their first breaths in our fair city. The most by any other city is Toronto with 18 players followed by 13 from Calgary (ugh). No wonder we love our hockey so much ... TB
Hornswaggled Attention animal cruelty protesters outside of Rexall: leave the place tidy (and maybe leave behind some cool protest signs) for Oiler fans. The more sensitive of the fan base will probably be protesting cruelty to themselves in time for the team’s return. Really. If you want a good reality check you should read the blogs and message boards. Apparently being a “fan” means screaming for the coach’s head, calling the GM names, bitching about the RBK uniforms and letting the team’s crappy results cause depression and anger. DY
Good news/ Bad news Good news! The fledgling Western Hockey League Oil Kings (dressed as the “Rodeo Kings” for a recent home game promotion) aren’t doing that badly. The team was sitting with a record of 8-8-1-2 as of Tuesday night. Bad news! The Oil Kings are an EXPANSION TEAM. Expansion teams are expected to do poorly and have an excuse ready. They’re overachieving. The Oilers (with a record of 5-10 as of Tuesday night) cannot use that excuse. Even the “Baby Oilers” in Springfield (the Falcons—the Oil’s AHL farm team) are 5-5-0-2. DY
Bull-dogger bloggers Here’s a couple hockey picks for interweb surfers: Lowetide (lowetide.blogspot.com) is the grand-daddy of the Oiler blog world. Part history lesson, part daily diary of Oiler adventures. If Abe Simpson was more clear-headed and knew hockey that would be Lowetide. Edmonton Journal writer David Staples has some colourful and quite entertaining Oiler-fan blogs on the Big Paper’s corporate website (if you’re into that). I read some entries and he didn’t mention U2 in any of them. Shocker. DY