Before the Oilers left on their road trip, @Oscar Klefbom stopped by the TSN 1260 studios to voice a commercial. When he was finished he joined Jason Strudwick and me on air for an impromptu interview.

We discussed a bit about hockey, but focused more on his family, Christmas, Volvos and uncovered which one of his teammates is the least fashion-conscience.

He was in studio the day after the Oilers defeated Colorado 6-3, when @Connor McDavid had six points and Leon Draisaitl picked up five.

Oscar Klefbom: Oh yeah, it makes it easier for sure. Coming into the locker room after the game, you have three apples; you feel pretty good about yourself. And then you look to your right and Connor is sitting there with six points. But you know what, I’m pretty happy with the helmet. I’ve got to keep it for sure.

Klefbom: Absolutely, I totally agree. And some nights I don’t have any assists or any goals, but I feel really good about my game overall. And yesterday I was not really happy with my game overall but I got three assists. Everyone is happy and obviously we got two points.

Kelfbom: I’m a pretty tough on my game. It is small things…going back for pucks and getting the puck out of our zone real quick, or making a solid first pass, or making the wrong read. Obviously, there’s always stuff that I can improve on and I want to be as perfect as I can be.

But obviously over here it’s a lot of focus from the media standpoint and from the fans and all of these fantasy hockey owners about whatever I’m doing… plus minus or points or whatever. But I can play a really solid game, be really happy about myself and even though I don’t have any points, or I might be a dash two or whatever, I can still feel good about myself and that’s really important I think.

Klefbom: It’s funny you brought that up because I was thinking the other day how it took me a long time before I felt comfortable being on the power play, and handling that responsibility, because you have a lot of guys that want to be on the power play.

And obviously like you said you can get some points when you are on the power play, especially with Connor and Leon [Draisaitl] and [Ryan Nugent-Hopkins] Nuge and those guys. But it took me a long time to actually feel comfortable. I felt a lot of pressure and it’s easy to just go out there and give the puck to Connor or Leon or whatever, but I feel like I want to be out there for a reason and be a threat as well. They put me on the power play for a reason and obviously I want to continue to be a threat out there even though we have some of the best players in the world.

Klefbom: The players in the league who kill penalties are really good right now; they’re so good at being in the shooting lane. So for a defenseman or a quarterback as we call it, you have to have some poise on the blueline to create seams, to create the shooting line and to create ice for the other players. Obviously, take the shot when it’s there. So it takes some time and obviously when you play with the new players, Connor and Leon, you want to make them the best players they can be on the ice. They’re really good with the puck, so I want to keep it really simple on my part. I think I have improved on moving to areas to receive the puck, but also slight movement that pulls the penalty killer over and that allows me to give the puck to the forwards when they have more space and time.

Klefbom: Yeah this is the best year by far. There are five of us including Willy Lagesson in Bakersfield.

Klefbom: Ah not really, not yet.

Gregor: What kind of parties?

Klefbom: No you take this one. I don’t even know what you mean (laughs).

Klefbom: … Easter.

Klefbom: Jewel-Moost.

Klefbom: (laughs) Julmust parties, I had no idea, and now I know.

Klefbom: Yeah, IKEA. We’re just waiting for it to come out, we’re going to be there and we’re going to buy… a lot of it.

Klefbom: Not really. Where I live downtown that’s probably the only place right now (smiles).

Klefbom: Yes, well, I like to be in the kitchen for sure. I’m very interested in food overall so I spend a lot of time there.

Klefbom: It’s called like… you can call it princess cake back home. Yeah.

Klefbom: Ah, no, that’s probably my girlfriend’s.

Klefbom: I’m more of the steak, fish, main course guy. I leave the deserts to the others. Julmust and princess cakes Struddy, that’s for you (laughs).

Klefbom: You know what, the last couple of years, they’ve come out with some new models. And they look pretty good. Volvo has been very big back home for many, many years now and they put a lot of efforts in and Zlatan Ibrahimovic, big soccer player, he’s like the franchise guy back for it. He drove one a couple of years ago. I like it, it’s good. It’s nice to stay with the Swedish connection here, so it’s good. The guys at Volvo of Edmonton are great.

Klefbom: Yeah, it depends where you live. I live in the same area as Jujhar Khaira so he usually goes with me or I go with him. Coming home late from road trips or whatever it’s nice to just go with somebody.

Klefbom: The one that I had a couple of years ago?

Klefbom: This is the best song of all time (laughs).

Klefbom: Ah… um yeah. I would like that. You know what? I’ll probably pick this one that I just heard.

Klefbom: (Laughs) I’ll go with the real version though.

Klefbom: I think so too.

Gregor: Well I know that it wouldn’t be a Celine Dion song, that’s for sure. Oscar, if you don’t know, she snubbed him at a party once.

Klefbom: Oh my.

Klefbom: No, not really.

Klefbom: (Laughs) Not even close, not yet.

Klefbom: Yeah, we do.

Klefbom: Sometimes. I don’t know if I should say this here, but he actually had some problems with, something with a pimple on his face or something right now so the boys are all over him. He’s pretty grumpy right now (laughs).

Klefbom: Um… Neal is up there for sure. He spends a lot of time on his suits, and overall how he looks and he dresses.

Klefbom: Nuge. It’s hopeless so you should just…

Klefbom: Yeah.

Klefbom: He looks alright, he actually picked it up the last couple of years, but when I first came in and met him the first couple of years it was just free clothes from CCM and he didn’t care.

Klefbom: Yeah, I mean it’s been better overall from the rest of the guys, I think. Like you said, European style is usually better than the North American style, overall. But it’s actually been better lately for the North American guys. But over here, I mean let’s be honest, it’s (clothes) just too big. It’s too saggy. It’s too much…

Klefbom: Perfect fit. (Laughs)

Klefbom: The season, I mean 82 games, you cannot focus on hockey all of the time. For me I’ve learned over the years not to think about hockey when I don’t have to. Obviously, it’s great to be engaged and obviously you can like hockey and you can watch some other teams play and all of that. But for me personally I try to stay away as much as I can because it’s a long season and if you want to be 100% engaged and focused on the games, and when you come into the rink I think that’s its better to stay away from it when you can.

Klefbom: So, I usually keep in touch with all of my friends and family back home and obviously with the time change it’s pretty hard. So right after practice I usually go home and see what it’s like back home and talk to friends and family and then straight to the grocery store, get ready for dinner.

Klefbom: That was great. First time for her for the moms’ trip. My dad, obviously we had fathers’ trip twice and he loved it. It was my mom’s turn and I was really happy that she could make it and it’s great for the whole organization. It’s a lot of good energy and it’s special to play in front of your mom.

Gregor: How different was a mom trip compared to a Dads trip?

Klefbom: (Laughs) It’s different. It’s very different. I think for the moms it doesn’t really matter if we play good or bad, they’re the same. They’re there for us, they support us. Our dad, or at least my dad is very engaged. He coached hockey back home, he likes the sport himself. So, he’s engaged and obviously he wants to see us win and do well so if we play a bad game or whatever, obviously he wants to see us win, so he’s not too happy when we lose.

Klefbom: Oh yeah, so far so good. We’re off to a good start.

Klefbom: It’s very important to me. My family means a lot and they’ve been there throughout my whole career, even back home in Sweden they were always there. And it’s tough, I mean, to be away eight, nine, hopefully, more months a year from the family and friends back home, it means a lot when they can come over and spend some time. I’m very happy that they come over now.

Klefbom: We can probably solve that.

Klefbom: (Laughs) I’ll get it. Oh yeah, for sure, no worries.

Klefbom: The pickled herring. Yeah, we have a lot of different kind of cured salmon, pickled herring, a lot of fish overall. The Swedish meatballs, can never go wrong with that. We don’t really do turkey, but we do have ham and stuff but overall it is different.

Klefbom: First off, we celebrate the 24^th so that’s probably the biggest.

Klefbom: Jultomten.

(Laughter erupts.)

Klefbom: Thanks for having me. That was fun.

Klefbom has a good, subtle sense of humour. During the break after the interview we talked about his family and he was so pumped to get to spend Christmas with them. He was fired up. He also spoke about wanting to keep improving on the powerplay, and how learning the tendencies of the other guys on the PP has made it much easier.

They are more in sync than before, and he works a lot on the little things. How much of a difference sliding over a few inches to his right or left can alter how the high penalty kill players react, and that opens up more options for half wall players. His main responsibilities might not show up on the scoresheet as often on the PP, but Strudwick spoke about how the movement from Klefbom will really alter the penalty kill. He feels it shouldn’t be overlooked as to why the PP is doing so well. It isn’t the main aspect, but an important piece to having one of the best powerplays in the NHL.