How about them Oilers

Erik Cole earns his hat trick - the hard way. The nose to the grindstone, blood sweat and tears way. What a heckuva player.

Speaking of great performances, how about Brule and Brodziak, the latter of the pair was +4 on the night and I wish he would play like this more often. If Brodziak could be a defensively reliable centerman who won faceoffs, scored at a reasonable rate and chipped in the occasional offensive night such as he did against Washington, we would make the trading of Jarret Stoll and Matt Greene a no-lose situation.

As great as I thought Rob Schremp, Ryan Potulny, and Liam Reddox looked when coming up to Edmonton from the Falcons, it pales by comparison to my new found likening to Gilbert Brule's hockey tenacity.

He may be around for a while, fellas.

P.S. Congratulations, Steve MacIntyre!

The Fate of the Kid Line

Predictions

Will Robbie Schremp keep up his scoring pace? Will Gilbert Brule be a factor in upcoming games? Will Sam Gagner and Robert Nilsson come back from injury and take their roster spots back with a vengeance?

The game in San Jose was a big win but let's be honest -- the Oilers were chasing pucks and not defending players. Back-to-back games or not, it's simple hockey not to chase the puck but to play the man. I was surprised at the poise of some of the younger players in the last game.

Please leave your comments and predictions.

Saint Roloson & Fire MacTavish

The Power of Christ Roloson Compels You

The Oilers always play well against the San Jose Sharks. Okay, I lied, our Edmonton goalies always play well against the San Jose Sharks. The Oilers have become really adept at killing Sharks' winning streaks. Good for Gilbert Brule who played hard enough to draw the penalty for that game-winning powerplay.

Last season, it was the Oilers who snapped a Sharks' winning streak at 11 games in a 2-1 SO victory. This year, it's the Oilers who snapped a Sharks' nine game winning streak. The common thread? Dwayne Roloson was in net. 48 saves on 49 shots plus the SO last year; 41 saves on 43 shots this season.

Now, some credit could be given to MacTavish for his 60 minute penalty kill "keep em to the outside" style but let's be honest here. If Roloson doesn't stand on his head all night -- there's no win.

Hopefully the Oilers come out of this one realising how badly we got outplayed though. Without our stellar goaltending, where would our Oilers be now? We have 3 goalies on the roster and they have all played well with a few bad games here and there. But for the most part, all 3 have looked like legitimate starters at some point. What is a team to do?

The consequence of watching a game like this has converted me from a MacBooster to the Let's Fire MacTavish camp. I am now officially convinced that we have the tools to make this a good team but the coaching staff is inept, whereas before I was waiting on Tambellini to make a move. Roloson is 39 and he's a Saint, but can he do this for the rest of the season? Even Tim Thomas probably couldn't go through 42 games of being outshot 40-something to umpteen. Surely we're not going to keep this 3-headed monster heading into the playoffs, should we qualify for them?

The reliance on goaltending on this team is amazing. How can Oilers fans make fun of the Canucks for relying on Luongo, the Flames for relying on Kiprusoff, or the Stars for relying on Turco? Their reliance on goaltending is imcomparable to ours, because our team can't even get more than 20 shots a lot of games.

To be fair, it is the San Jose Sharks we're talking about and we did outshoot Los Angeles last night and we did play back-to-back games that went to extra time. It's true. But I think it's time to realise that this team needs a new direction.

Fire Craig MacTavish.

Gilbert Brule debuts with Oilers

Is this the new kid line?

By debut we're not talking about an 18 year old girls family-run birthday party. We're talking about the 4th most talked-about Oiler pickup in the off season behind Cole, Visnovsky, and MacIntyre. We're talking about Gilbert Brule here, people.

I'd imagine MacTavish has the sense not to break up the Schremp-Cogliano-Pouliot line, since it's outperforming most of our other lines and with Pouliot looking like a real NHL player, it can't be bad for anyone.

Either Strudwick stays on LW or Gilbert Brule draws in. Brule should draws in unless Smid suffered a concussion on the Stoll hit... still, since Liam Reddox looks better on LW than he did centering a line with Strudwick and Stortini, I'd imagine Brule gets the call.

Penner-Horcoff-Hemsky
Schremp-Cogliano-Pouliot
Moreau-Brodziak-Cole
Reddox-Brule-Stortini (or Strudwick)

D-pairings stay the same

Roloson (I'd imagine he gets the start)
Garon

The Oilers always play well against the Sharks though this time around the Sharks are the #1 team in the NHL for their first matchup this season.

Fingers-crossed that the Oilers pull out of this one for the betterment of the team.

Baptism by Hemsky

The answer to the age old question of "Who made God?" has been discovered. The answer is Ales Hemsky.

Robbie Schremp, HockeyJesus himself, when placed next to Hemsky, made it apparent to all whose "right hand" the Bible's been talking about all along. Ales Hemsky's.

And the Los Angeles Kings experienced a Baptism by Hemsky tonight. Great move for the shootout winner and better move for the Penner tying goal.

Just amazing.

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During the Game...

... some breakouts were sloppy as hell but great puck movement was shown by Visnovsky, Gilbert, Grebeshkov, and Ethan Moreau.

... Erik Cole and Shawn Horcoff were dangerous all night.

... something dangerous happened everytime Schremp and Staios were on the ice. The difference? Schremp makes it happen in the offensive zone and Staios makes it happen in the defensive zone.

... Garon let out a lot of juicy rebounds.

... it was apparent that Brodziak was squeezing his stick a little too hard but he still managed to do all the simple things right, like get pucks deep. One notably bad giveaway in the defensive zone - but hey, mistakes happen.

... Souray played like a monster with a lasers. Except that his lasers are his slapshots and instead of coming out of his eyes like any decent laser-wielding monster, they come off the blade of his stick. Who woulda thunkit?

... Ales Hemsky showed why he is the most valuable Oiler player in at least about a decade. Yes, I must say even more than my favorite former/current Oiler, Tommy Salo.

... the Oilers couldn't kill off L.A. PPs. Work on it.

... Strudwick looked better as a forward than he did as a defenseman. He should stay there because Smid looked good.

... Marc-Antoine Pouliot looked like a good hockey player tonight. Was at all the right places to receive passes and backchecked like a demon. Might sense some movement in the "Prospect, Player, or Trade Bait" rankings if he keeps this up. Same goes for Schremp.

... Liam Reddox looked useful playing different roles. Love this hockey player.

... Dustin Penner was dominant.

... the Oilers disappeared for the second period.

... the Oilers showed that they cannot keep the lead if their lives depended on it.

... the Oilers showed what kind of depth the organization has with 4 regulars (5 if you count Jeff Drouin-DesLauriers) out with injuries large and small.

... Andrew Cogliano beat Jarret Stoll on the faceoff. There is hope after all.

... the Oilers won puck battles. Time to translate that hard work and success to the PK.

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Gilbert Brule plays tomorrow against the NHL leading San Jose Sharks. Gulp. Brule has 8 goals and 4 assists so he's a shoot first kind of player. Could have a drastically different impact on this team than a Sam Gagner or a Jason Strudwick.

Also, can Schremp keep up his scoring pace of 1.5 pts/GP? So far, some people may say that Cogliano makes Schremp look a lot better than he is. I'd argue that Schremp has made Pouliot look a lot better than he is, though Mr. Chicken has put in some hard work in the last two games himself. I think having those 3 elements - speed, skill, and "rough and tumble" are giving this line success.

But is it sustainable?

Need proof of their imminent success? They're already Legends of Hockey, apparently.

( Gilbert Brule, Robbie Schremp )