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K.McC#24 Messages: 2831
Registered: March 2004
Location: ALBERTA
2 Cups
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RDOilerfan wrote on Mon, 20 January 2020 10:05 | I took my oldest to the game, pretty awesome game to take him too with all the goals.
Maybe it was just an off day but Arizona sure didn't look very impressive at all for a team that is in a battle for first place. Smith had to make some good saves a few times but that's normal in my opinion for an NHL goalie. Hall scored a goal but I thought it was a goal that Smith should have had and given his reaction after (him looking to the ceiling), I think he felt it was a weak goal. Other than that, I didn't notice him and he was brutal defensively. If I didn't know Kessel's number, I wouldn't have known he was on the ice. Arizona's centers look WEAK. When your best center is Stephan, I don't know how you compete in the playoffs. They look like a team that relies heavily on excellent goaltending.
I came away pretty impressed by the Oilers this game. It was a big game, they knew it and they came out and wanted this game. The bottom 6 is really starting to come around. It's pretty evident to me that they have to have McDavid and Leon split up. I said it many times, if you have a player like McDavid who will produce with almost anyone, you have to use that to your advantage. Loading up McDavid's line with your absolute best players which diluted your other lines, made no sense to me. They throw out the McDavid line who has decent wingers on it, then Leon's line comes out after who has better wingers. As an opposition team, who do you put out your best d pairing against? If you decide to try to shut down Leon's line, then you have McDavid skating circles around lesser dmen. If you match McDavid, you have a very good second line.
I said it before and his recent success proves it in my opinion. Nuge is a much better top 6 winger than center. He needs to be told that and accept that.
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Just like Leon for a stretch individually was a better winger than a 2nd line center. These guys are going to be in flux, and this iteration will change at some point. I think this has worked in part because Yamamoto has been effective so far, and Leon isn't out there being atrocious on the backcheck as a center or throwing up those blind backhand prayer passes into the middle for guaranteed turnovers. I dont think Nuge needs to be told anything or made to accept anything, I dont think he's pouting or unaccepting of anything....I mean, if that were Nuge, how the hell would he have been an Oiler this long and not have gotten the hell out of here?
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