Adam wrote on Mon, 07 March 2022 09:19

CrusaderPi wrote on Mon, 07 March 2022 08:35 I'm semi-bullish on the mighty Oil right now. Disappointing game against Montreal notwithstanding, they played reasonably well on the road trip and the new coach looks like he's figuring out the goaltending. There's signs that warrant tepid optimism. We've generally played pretty well versus teams in the division and we know that Smith won't play today, which gives us a better chance. We're definitely still missing a few of the injured guys, especially Nugent-Hopkins and Puljujarvi, but I think that the Oilers have a good shot tonight.

I think under the new coaching staff the Oilers are at least close to maximizing their roster right now (although I'm not a huge fan of Woodcroft basically only playing 3 fwd lines - maybe this is how he's signaling to Holland to call up Marody), but they're still not a great team. I think if Woodcroft had been the HC from the start of the season, the Oilers are probably solidly in a playoff spot right now. As it is it looks like is going to come right down to the wire.

And while I don't think that Flames are elite right now (I think the 4 elite teams in the league are Colorado, Florida, Tampa and Carolina), but Calgary is right below them. Of course, McDavid could score 4 tonight and then it's all irrelevant

Oilers Goal Differential
17/18: 234 GF / 263 GA (-29)
18/19: 232 GF / 274 GA (-42)
19/20 (82 game pace): 257 GF / 254 GA (+3) in 64 games
2021 (82 game pace):269 GF / 235 GA (+34) after 38 games