Sweating the Small Stuff
3 years ago
Richard Carlson, author of Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff and It’s All Small Stuff, has sold a lot of books catering to the self-help crowd. Mind you, Carlson has never stood behind an NHL bench watching two points slip away like Edmonton Oilers’ coach Dave Tippett did in a 4-3 loss to the Calgary Flames on Monday.
Darryl Sutter, who sweats the small stuff, the big stuff and the in-between stuff, improved to 3-0-0 since his return to the Calgary bench because his Flames took care of the details better than the Oilers did last night. In an edition of the BOA that had some bite to it – Jujhar Khaira’s uncalled headshot hit on Oliver Kylington and subsequent scrap with Brett Ritchie – a lack of emotion wasn’t the problem. Getting out-detailed by Sutter’s team was.
A bounce here, a bad decision there was the difference. @Dillon Dube opened the scoring on a neutral zone turnover by @Connor McDavid, made worse by @Ethan Bear heading to the bench with a busted skate blade. @Mike Smith, who has been battling his ass off, mishandled the puck on Andrew Mangiapane’s 3-1 goal. Then, after the Oilers came back to get even at 3-3, Bear was caught pinching on Noah Hanifin’s game winner.
Add it up and you get what we’ve got here. The Flames are 3-0-0 under Sutter and back in the playoff hunt in the North Division at 14-12-3 for 31 points. The Oilers, 2-1 losers against the Canucks in Vancouver Saturday, have dropped two straight and are 18-13-0 and five points up on the Flames going into a rematch Wednesday. The small stuff bit them in both games.
WHAT THEY SAID
Mar 15, 2021; Calgary, Alberta, CAN; Edmonton Oilers head coach Dave Tippett on his bench during a timeout against the Calgary Flames during the third period at Scotiabank Saddledome.
“Three of the four goals, it was a couple of poor reads and a couple of turnovers,” Tippett said. “So, our fingers were all over the goals we gave them. You come out of the first period, we know they’re going to come hard, we come out of it 0-0. We’ve got to pick up the pace a little bit and then made some mistakes to get behind.
“We got ourselves back in the game and then we made another mistake to give it away. We’ll continue to pound away here, continue to get better. When we were winning it wasn’t too high and when you’re losing it isn’t too high. You’ve just got to make sure you’re focusing on what the next game is and what you’ve got to do to be better.”
Smith, who is 9-3-0 with a 2.31 GAA and .921 save-percentage in 14 appearances, misplayed a bouncing puck leading to the 3-1 goal. That’s going to happen with a goaltender who handles the rubber as much as he does. While I cringe sometimes when he goes wandering, I don’t recall another time this season when his pursuit of the rubber ended up in the back of the net — correct me if I’m wrong. It happens.
“He’s an awesome stick handler, and he gives us a lot of easy breakouts,” said Adam Larsson, who jumped up and shovelled a rebound past Jacob Markstrom to make it 2-1. “He’s going to give up (a goal) once in a while, but he gives us a lot more. It was a fluky goal. That will happen. He played unreal the rest of the game, and even before, too. We are trusting Smitty back there.”
THE WAY I SEE IT
With the standings as tight as they are in the North Division – the Toronto Maple Leafs lead with 40 points, nine up on the fifth-place Flames — lost points because of details the Oilers didn’t take care of Monday matter. The Oilers played reasonably well overall in these last two losses, but reasonably well doesn’t get it – especially with the Flames surging so far under Sutter.
“They play a really structured, strong game with their new coach, but we came back,” Larsson said. “We had a chance to win the game, but we didn’t. We’re still a confident group . . . we just have to win the game. That’s how simple it is. There are no secrets behind it. We just have to win.”
Sutter has the Flames playing the kind of hockey they couldn’t or wouldn’t under Geoff Ward and the Oilers are going to see plenty more of what they got Monday – the teams have five games left to play head-to-head, starting Wednesday. The Oilers have to sweat the details because you can bet the farm the Flames will be doing likewise the rest of the way.
Previously by Robin Brownlee
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