Tonight, the Oilers are back at Rogers Place for a Saturday night showdown against the Colorado Avalanche, and if there were ever a time to find their best hockey, this would be it. After blowing two-goal leads in three of their last four games, the vibes around here are getting a little tense, and a matchup with the best team in the Western Conference isn’t exactly a soft landing to try and regroup. The Avs sit first in the Central Division at 8-1-5 and have been everything the Oilers are supposed to be right now: consistent, dangerous, and ruthless when it matters.

Looking at Colorado’s numbers, it doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to figure out why they’ve had a hot start to the year. They’ve outscored their opponents 50 to 37 through 14 games, their penalty kill is ripping at 90.5 percent, and they’ve been one of the tighest teams in the league when it comes to giving up high-danger chances. Their goaltending hasn’t exactly been lights out — they’re sitting at .898 save perentage at 5v5 vs. the Oilers’ .897 — but it hasn’t needed to be when the team in front of them plays this efficiently. Of course, Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar are doing their usual alien-level stuff, but what really separates the Avs from the Oilers is how they don’t beat themselves. They’re not giving teams a chance to get off the mat when they’re down, something Edmonton has struggled with at an extreme level lately.

For our boys, the problem is a mix of effort and execution. Thursday’s loss in Dallas was like watching another scene in the same movie as the loss in St. Louis. Two-goal lead? Gone. Sloppy puck management? You bet. Missed coverages and failed clears? Check. Goalies couldn’t cover up the mistakes? We got that too. The Oilers have now given up at least three goals in seven of their last eight games, and until they clean up their defensive habits and stop handing out free chances, it won’t matter how talented we expect their roster to be. The good news? They’ve been through this before and found ways to rebound. The bad news? We shouldn’t still be talking about learning the same lessons in mid-November for the third season in a row.

The Oilers sit at 6-5-4 through 15 games, which isn’t necessarily grim but definitely not great either. The power play is still doing its thing at 35.0 percent, but the penalty kill has started to slip lately at 78.4 percent, and their 48 percent expected goals share tells you exactly what your eyes already have — they’re not dictating play nearly enough at even strength. Connor McDavid leads the team with 21 points, Leon Draisaitl is right there behind him, Jack Roslovic is hot, and Ryan Nugent-Hopkins has been steady to start, but Edmonton’s depth scoring is once again not providing enough when the big dogs aren’t on the ice. You can’t rely on your top guys to score everything, especially against a team that’s playing as well as Colorado right now.

There is good news, though, friends. The Oilers have actually played the Avalanche pretty well in recent years, winning three of the last five regular-season matchups and taking points in eight of their last 10 overall. Stuart Skinner earned both wins against the Avs last season, stopping 49 of 53 shots, and I couldn’t think of a better time for Stu to turn in a strong performance than on a night when his team desperately needs a win. At some point, Edmonton’s talent needs to translate to results, and doing it against an opponent with true Stanley Cup aspirations would go a long way toward proving we can still get this train back on the rails. We know one night doesn’t make a season, but a win against Colorado would sure go a long way to quieting down some of the noise around here.

There’s no lipsticking the pig that will make Oilers fans feel better, and the only way through this early-season purgatory is to start stringing together some wins. From my side of the laptop screen, this isn’t a “just another game” on the schedule, it’s a gut check. The Oilers have to decide whether they’re happy to keep floating around .500 or if they’re going to start looking like a team that actually expects to win every night. Colorado will punish every mistake they make, so the boys need to be sharp, structured, and play with some urgency right from the opening faceoff. I don’t want to see ‘too little, too late’ again. The longer they let these bad habits stick around, the harder it’s going to be to shake the feeling that maybe they aren’t the juggernaut we keep saying they are.

If the Oilers want to prove that they are those guys, tonight’s the night to make it happen.

Let’s see what the numbers say…

THE NUMBERS

	OILERS	AVALANCHE
RECORD	6-5-4	8-1-5
WIN/LOSS STREAK	L2	W1
LAST 10 GAMES	4-3-3	5-1-4
GOALS FOR	46	50
GOALS AGAINST	48	37
POWER PLAY%	35.0	17.0
PENALTY KILL%	78.4	90.5
GOALS FOR/GAME	2.88	3.57
GOALS AGAINST/GAME	3.00	2.50
AVG. SHOTS/FOR	28.9	34.1
AVG. SHOTS/AGAINST	24.9	25.1
TEAM SAVE%	.897	.898
CORSI FOR%	50.36	56.90
PDO	0.973	0.995
TEAM SHOOTING%	7.62	9.65
EXPECTED GOALS FOR%	48.94	59.61

Numbers courtesy of Natural Stat Trick (Sv%, CF%, PDO, Shooting%, xGF% all at 5×5)

The Oilers have won three of their last five games against Colorado, and have earned at least a point in eight of their last 10 regular season games against them — our boys have a 5-2-3 in that stretch.
Mattias Ekholm leads all active Oilers in career games (42) vs. Colorado, while Connor McDavid leads the active team in career points (35). Speaking of Ekholm, Big Viking Daddy will suit up for his 900th career NHL game tonight.
Connor McDavid has hit the scoresheet in seven of his last nine games against the Avalanche for a total of 11 points (3G, 8A). McDavid also set a career-high six points (3G, 3A) against the Avalanche back on November 14th, 2019.
Leon Draisaitl has recorded points (3G, 8A) in seven of his last nine games against Colorado, while Ryan Nugent-Hopkins has points (3G, 8A) in seven of his last nine against them as well.

LINEUPS…

Oilers

Draisaitl – McDavid – Roslovic
Podkolzin – RNH – Mangiapane
Henrique – Philp – Frederic
Howard – Tomasek – Savoie

Ekholm – Bouchard
Nurse – Regula
Kulak – Walman

Skinner

Just when you thought the Oilers’ top-six was starting to build some chemistry, Kris Knoblauch fired up the blender for another round of maybe the grass is greener. Maybe Knobby is loading up the top line specifically because we’re playing Colorado, but I would have preferred to see if the lines that were starting to work a little bit could handle a stress test like this. As much as I understand that having McDavid and Draisaitl together is a nuclear deterrent that’s hard to ignore, it’s hard to argue that the Oilers aren’t a much deeper team when they’re apart.

Avalanche

Lehkone – MacKinnon – Necas
Colton – Nelson – Nichushkin
Landeskog – Drury – Olofsson
Kelly – Bardokov – Brindley

Toews – Makar
Manson – Burns
Solovyov – Malinski

Wedgewood

I wrote it up top, and I’ll say it again here, but the Avalanche are a team built to capitalize on mistakes. If the Oilers think they’re going to get away with loose puck management against this team, then we may as well just hang the ‘L’ on the board now. The Avs are too good, too deep, and too structured to be giving up freebies, and as we all know, minding the details hasn’t exactly been Edmonton’s strong suit lately.