Nurse flies home as deal remains elusive

Two days into training camp and Darnell Nurse is not even in the province.

So, no, things are not going great on the contract front.

“We obviously couldn’t come to an agreement but we hope we can get him into camp at some point shortly,” said general manager Pete Chiarelli, who doesn’t think it’s a big deal that Nurse flew home to Toronto once camp opened and he was without a new deal.

“It’s part of the playbook, I guess. I know some of the RFAs around the league and some didn’t, but not really, no.”

Nurse and the Oilers are as much as $500,000 apart on a bridge deal, with the club not wanting to move much from the $3 million range. Nurse’s camp isn’t in the mood for budging, either.

“I don’t want to comment on specifics, but we’ve had a lot of negotiations, so we’ll see where it goes,” said Chiarelli. “But there’s a gap, I can tell you there’s a gap.”

The Oilers, who are also without injured defenceman Andrej Sekera, will need a Plan B if they can’t get Nurse signed in time for the season. Does Chiarelli have one?

“Yes I do,” he said. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

PRESSURE’S ON

Missing the playoffs three out of four years with Connor McDavid on the team?

That isn’t something anyone in Edmonton Oilers management wants to think about, but it’s a real possibility if they don’t figure out the areas of concern that made it two misses in three years last season.

There is real pressure to turn this thing around, lest they be accused of wasting one of the greatest talents to come along in decades.

“I think there’s added pressure, yeah,” said Chiarelli, who met with reporters on the first day of camp. “He’s in the limelight all the time and consequently our team is. We’re under the microscope anyway in a Canadian market, so that just magnifies it a little bit more.”

HOME GROWN

With defenceman at such a premium in the NHL, the Oilers are counting the days until 2015 draft picks Caleb Jones and Ethan Bear can lend a hand on the Edmonton blue line.

Given the progress from last season to this one, Chiarelli says they might not be that far off.