GBD 41.0 Wrap Up: Pete’s plan still not working: Oilers lose 4-0 in Los Angeles

5 years ago

My power was out until roughly six minutes before puck drop and after seeing the Oilers play tonight I wish it would have stayed out.

The first few shifts didn’t exactly go as planned as the Kings were buzzing and pinning the Oilers back in our own defensive end. This eventually leads to Kyle Clifford’s goal to open up the scoring. After the goal, the Oilers showed a little bit of life, putting up a few good shifts in a row and creating some scoring chances. That didn’t last long as the Oilers followed up with an absolute disaster of a shift where they were pretty much begging the Kings to score on them. Sure enough, Toffoli scored the second goal of the game.

Want me to continue?

Just a handful of minutes later, Jeff Carter wins another puck battle in his own end and casually skates the puck up the ice. One quick shot past Koskinen and the score is now 3-0. That ended up being the dagger for Koskinen as he was replaced by Talbot after giving up three goals on eight shots. The rest of the period involved a lot of shotty defence as well but thankfully we didn’t give up any more goals.

The second period began a lot more appropriate than the first. If the Oilers would have begun the game like that I and the rest of Twitter would have been much more satisfied. They battled hard and played pretty evenly with the Kings. It pretty much remained this way throughout the whole period. The Oilers took six more anti-climatic shots on net and finished the period still down by three goals. This was highly because of Cam Talbot, who played very well after Koskinen got pulled.

The third period reminded me of the first period except for fewer goals. Everybody in the country was pretty much tuned out during the period and no one really missed much. The Kings potted a nice goal halfway through the third period and the Oilers had a couple chances on the power play, but other than that nothing really exciting happened. Lucic and Kassian tried to mix things up at the end of the period after some frustration boiled over. Milan ended up getting a game misconduct for violently slashing Brendan Leipsic a few times. The game couldn’t have ended soon enough, and the Oilers have won three games in their last 10.

The wrap.

THE BRIGHT SIDE

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. I love seeing Zack Kassian play with Connor on the top line. People often forget that Kass was a first round pick and that he’s got skill and speed. Draisaitl also played on that line and the three of them were obviously the best forward line out there.
The Oilers had three powerplays this game and didn’t look awful. I mean, they didn’t score on any of them but they created some close chances and kept possession for most of the time. I know I’m grasping at straws here for Bright Side points, but what can one do?
Props to Cam Talbot for playing solid after coming in for the relief of Koskinen. That’s definitely not an easy thing to do, and he did everything in his power to get us back in the game.
Jeff Carter laid out Connor McDavid in the neutral zone near the end of the game. It was a clean hit, but it took Alex Chiasson 0.1 seconds to go after Carter to retaliate. This was a nice show of support for the captain and it was nice to see Chiasson back in the lineup tonight.
Caleb Jones had another big night of ice time tonight playing 22:43 out there. He didn’t look the greatest, but nobody did. If I’m him, I’m pumped that the coach trusts him enough to give him that many minutes as a rookie.

THE FACE PALMERS

It took about two minutes for Kyle Clifford to blow by Caleb Jones while driving to the net to score the first goal of the game. It was a nice play by him who tucked it behind Koskinen as he cut to the middle.
After literally three attempts to clear the zone, Petrovic and Manning turn the puck over ONE MORE ADDITIONAL TIME giving Tyler Toffoli the easiest goal possible in the first period to make the game 2-0. Siiiiiiighhhh
The entire first period was an absolute garbage fire and I couldn’t take another second of it. The shots were 9-3 and the Corsi was even worse.
Even though they came out a little stronger in the second period, the Oilers still only put up eight shots in the first half of the game. EIGHT SHOTS. The game ended with the shots being 23-16.
The Oilers broke a record tonight for the FEWEST amount of shots taken on net this season after two periods. (10)
Kopitar sniped one home halfway through the third period for his 300th career goal. It was the Kings’ fourth goal on 21 shots this game. Have I mentioned that the Kings have the fewest goals scored in the entire league? You guys can thank us later.
The Kings did a great job at containing Connor McDavid tonight which is even more of a red flag regarding our secondary scoring. We are all aware of this already but once again, if Connor, Leon, or Nuge doesn’t score, nobody does.
Alex Petrovic was on the ice for three goals against and only played 12 minutes. I mean, nobody played well tonight but for a guy trying to impress his new team, things aren’t going well for him.
Drew Doughty elbowed Connor McDavid in the face behind the play in the first period and nobody did a damn thing. Granted maybe they didn’t see it, but my blood boiled watching Doughty laugh about it on the bench afterwards and I would have loved to see someone stand up to him.

SCORING SUMMARY

1ST PERIOD

TIME	TEAM	DETAILS	SCORE
03:15	Los Angeles	Kyle Clifford (6) ASST: Drew Doughty (20), Derek Forbort (8)	0-1
09:35	Los Angeles	Tyler Toffoli (7) ASST: Drew Doughty (21)	0-2
13:57	Los Angeles	Jeff Carter (8) ASST: Brendan Leipsic (7), Jake Muzzin (13)	0-3