OILERS GAME DAY
Following are the five keys to Saturday’s game between the Edmonton Oilers and the Minnesota Wild at the Xcel Energy Center in Minnesota (noon TV: SportsNet Radio 630 CHED).
1. Hope Talbot stops bleeding Cam Talbot is off injured reserve and will be back in net after missing seven games with an upperbody problem. He hasn’t played since beating Arizona on Nov. 28. Laurent Brossoit was 3-4 as the starter, with wins in Calgary, Montreal and Columbus.
2. Great shot metrics, but …
The Oilers have taken 166 shots over their past four games but they’ve only won twice, which runs counter to the puck-possession, get-shots-on-net analytics theory. And they’ve only given up 96 shots with the puck continually being in the other team’s end. The Oilers lead the NHL in five-on-five shots with 1,671. But that’s a stat for losers (when they out-shoot the opponent they ’re 9-10-1). They would undoubtedly be just fine to get 25 shots against the Wild and score four goals.
3. What happened to King Leon? Leon Draisaitl has only one goal in his last eight games, a shorthanded marker against Philadelphia. He has just two goals in his last 11 games, and three in the past 17 games over the last month. He’s taken just 32 shots in those 17 games. He has a pedestrian 22 points. He’s 83rd in NHL scoring, tied with Kevin Fiala and J.T. Miller.
4. Breaking Wild’s penalty-kill mojo
In Columbus, the Oilers scored twice on the PP against the best home PK in the league, and they ’ll get another test against Minnesota, a team that’s given up only three goals in 47 tries in 15 home games this season. That’s a 93.6 per cent rate of efficiency in their own barn, tops in the league.
5. Try scoring first for a change The Oilers have only done that 12 times in their 32 games and they’re 8-3-1 when they do so. When they don’t, they’re a very fragile 5-14-1. Try leading after two periods, too. They’re 7-0 with the lead after 40 minutes. When they don’t have it, they’re 2-14. So there’s not a lot of comeback in the Oilers.
Big Matchup:
The Oilers will face another backup goalie in Alex Stalock. They have taken 87 shots against No. 2 goalies Curtis McElhinney in Toronto and Nashville’s Jusse Saros and haven’t scored a single goal. Will Stalock. who got his first NHL shutout in three years on Thursday against Toronto, follow McElhinney and Saros’s lead? Stalock is only playing because ex-Oiler Devan Dubnyk is out for several weeks with a right knee sprain.
Special Teams
Oilers: PP: 16-87, 18.4 per cent (17th). PK 29-104, 72.1 per cent (31st).
Wild: PP 19-88 21.6 per cent (fifth). PK 20-117, 82.9 per cent (ninth). Sick Bay:
Oilers: Adam Larsson (back), Andrej Sekera (knee)
Wild: Devan Dubnyk (knee), Zach Parise (back), Jared Spurgeon (groin, questionable)
Oilers Lines (projected)
Milan Lucic Connor McDavid ■
Jesse Puljujarvi
Patrick Maroon Ryan-NugentHopkins ■ Mike Cammalleri
Jujhar Khaira Leon Draisaitl
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Ryan Strome
Anton Slepyshev Mark Letestu ■
Zack Kassian
Defence pairings
Nurse-Russell
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Klefbom-Benning
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Davidson-Auvitu
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Goalies
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Laurent Brossoit
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Cam Talbot
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Wild Lines (projected)
Nino Niederreiter Mikko Koivu ■
Mikael Granlund
Jason Zucker Eric Staal Zack
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Mitchell
Joel Eriksson-Ek Matt Cullen
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Charlie Coyle
Tyler Ennis Daniel Winnik
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Chris Stewart
Defence pairings
Ryan Suter Matt Dumba
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Jonas Brodin Ryan Murphy
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Mike Reilly Nate Prosser
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Goalies
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Alex Stalock
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Steve Michalek
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