HOMETOWN VIBE SHOULD BOOST OILERS
Oilers put themselves in a great position by splitting first two games in Vancouver
Up to this point, the power struggle between the top two teams in the Pacific Division was all about earning home-ice advantage in the playoffs.
The Vancouver Canucks won that war — all four of them, in fact — by sweeping the regular-season series to make Rogers Arena the battleground to open the Western Conference second-round playoff series against the Edmonton Oilers.
And they made it five in a row by claiming the series-opener last week, before the Oilers bounced back with an overtime win in Game 2.
And just like that, with that one single, solitary victory, Edmonton managed to erase all the results of the past and changed the entire landscape of home-ice advantage against the Canucks, with three of the final five games in the series scheduled for
Rogers Place, beginning with Sunday's Game 3 showdown.
“We're excited to be back home,” Oilers forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins said prior to puck drop, as the series shifted to Edmonton for back-to-back games.
And you better believe the home crowd can make an impact on the visiting team's communication at crucial times in the playoffs.
“When it's that loud, you definitely notice it,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “We notice it at home. We felt it, we heard it in Vancouver. But for us, I think it just makes it more fun to play having an atmosphere like that. Obviously more fun in Edmonton when they're behind you, but at the same time you get energy from a loud crowd.”
While it didn't exactly wipe out the bad taste in their mouth from the five previous losses, the Oilers did manage to put the Canucks on their heels a bit with that lone overtime victory. And they did it without ever holding a lead in regulation on the way to that 4-3 win on Friday.
“I think the way that we fought back every time they went up one the other night is a good indication of how we can play, how we need to play,” Nugent-Hopkins said. “We've shown it a lot during the season by winning those tight games and not needing to score five, six goals to win every game. We can win those tight ones that are low-scoring too.
“I still believe that we have another level to get to here, so we expect that from ourselves.
But we're going to keep getting better.”
Not that the Oilers expect to see anything less from the Canucks, as they look to regain a chokehold on the series.
“We'll see their best, for sure,” Oilers defenceman Brett Kulak said. “Every game you come in, you have the plan of being at your best. Sometimes it's just not there early in the series maybe. But as the series goes on, it gets easier to find your best game.
“We saw it last round too, Los Angeles came out a couple games late in the series when they're desperate and they're hungry, and the pace takes on another level. So, I think we know what to expect.”
After all, the Canucks didn't win the division by lying down when things get tough, especially on the road, where they went 3-0 in a first-round series win over the Nashville Predators.
Over the regular-season, they went 23-14-4 (.610) in away games.
“We're a good road team, we can play on the road and have some good resolve,” Canucks coach
Rick Tocchet said. “I think you can play a low-scoring game or if we need some goals, we've gone on the road where we had to score some goals. I think we have a good sample size where we can feel comfortable playing on the road.”
Of course, the biggest benefit to a coach playing at home is having the last change with their lines in order to get preferential matchups. And against the Oilers, that can become a tall order if Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl end up playing on the same line alongside 50-goal scorer Zach Hyman — as the Canucks witnessed in Game 2.
But it's nothing Tocchet shies away from.
“That's why we went and got Lindy,” Tocchet said of mid-season acquisition Elias Lindholm. “We have four good centres. That helps when you're on the road and you have mismatches, having that four-centre rotation.”