Krueger will stay behind bench
Q: The more I watch Edmonton Oilers head coach Ralph Krueger in this lockout-shortened NHL season, the more I think of George Burnett, who was fired after 35 games behind the Oilers bench in the 199495 lockout season. Will Krueger end up like Burnett?
( Dino Noce)
A: No — absolutely not. Burnett was coaching the Oilers’ American Hockey League farm team and owner Peter Pocklington thought he was a better pick than Oilers assistant coach Ron Low, who ended up replacing Burnett. As for Krueger, he’s a good coach and his players haven’t quit on him. After all, they did beat the Blackhawks 6-5 in Chicago on Sunday. It’s simply a bad mix of players on this Oilers team. It’s nice to say you have all this skill, but, again, the mix is wrong. There are very few high-end Oilers who arrive at the puck in ill humour. Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Sam Gagner and the rest are all very skilled and work hard, but the Oilers are crying out for a pain-inthe-butt Brad Marchand type of agitator in the top six to nine and somebody in the top six who will park themselves in the blue paint and not leave. They need someone like Ryan Smyth when he was 25, or even someone who will get to the blue paint, where 80 per cent of NHL goals are scored. This Oilers problem is general manager Steve Tambellini’s problem. He cannot have another new coach. He has had Craig MacTavish, Pat Quinn, Tom Renney and Krueger behind the bench since 2008. The only sure thing if I’m an Oilers fan right now is that I’d be as mad as hell. There has been no appreciative improvement in the team this season. Q: Whatever happened to the player the Oilers invited to training camp in that television show Making the Cut several years ago?
( Brandon Smart) A: The Making the Cut reality hockey show in 2004 invited 68 undrafted players to a two-week camp in Vernon, B.C. The six Canadian NHL teams then picked one player to attend training camp. The Oilers chose big defenceman Jordan Little from Winnipeg who had played for the University of Manitoba. Little played three years with the Bisons and actually played four AHL games for the Roadrunners when the Oilers farm team was based there during the 2004-05 lockout. He bounced around, playing in the ECHL (Greenville, Bakersfield), International Hockey League (Kalamazoo, Muskegon), Central Hockey League (Wichita, Evansville). Little, now 31, is a first-year assistant coach of a Southern Professional Hockey League team in Huntsville (Alabama) this season. You can email any questions about the NHL, along with your full name to: jmatheson@edmontonjournal. com. Jim will answer a sampling of your queries in Journal Sports. edmontonjournal. com Check out the Journal’s website for an archive of previous questions and answers: edmontonjournal.com/hockey