THE BRIGHT SIDE

• Welcome back to the NHL, Jesse Puljujarvi! Nuge was a puck thief near the blue line and Puljujarvi buried it after RNH fed it to him. No dusting the puck off on this one. Puljujarvi was easily once of the best Oilers today and he was doing all the things you’d hope he would in his first game back. Solid season debut for the big Finn.
• Gregor tweeted out a stat this morning, “McDavid, Draisaitl, Lucic, Maroon and Klefbom have combined 315:44 TOI on the PP. Have 0 goals.” Those are some big hitters that need to contribute when they have the man advantage. McDavid got his first on the power play and 7th of the season by smashing a loose puck past Lundqvist to give the Oilers a temporary lead.
• After the Rangers opened the scoring, the Oilers bounced back with a few great shifts including a beauty where RNH was able to keep the puck in the zone, knock it over to the wing, and Pool Party buried it. Obviously, that shift resulted in a goal so you’d assume it was good but the puck checking with determination was something we need to see more of.
• I can’t hang this game on Cam Talbot. After a slow start to the season, the guy has started to take his game to another level, especially on the road. Even though he got tagged for three today it’s hard to blame him when you consider the two power play goals the Rangers scored were all tic-tac-toe players. To me, he was once again one of the best Oilers, finishing the day with 30 saves and a .909 save%.
• The Year of Nuge continues with another assist tonight which gives him 12 points on the year. That translates to a 60+ point season. Chiarelli needs to do whatever he needs to do to keep Nuge on this hockey team. Remember, he just turned 24 in April.
• Oilers were back up to 53% in the faceoff circle which is an area that has greatly improved this year.

THE FACE PALMERS

• Rick Nash opened the scoring after he found a lane on a 2-on-1 with Kevin Hayes. Hayes made a perfect pass across and Nash clapped it past Talbot. I supposed Klefbom could have laid out or something, but he was in too deep which allowed Hayes to find Nash in the first place. Nash scored another goal late in the second period after the Oilers decided it would be a good idea to start a parade to the penalty box.
• The Oilers got caught with a delay of game penalty (Malone over the glass) and Buchnevich was the beneficiary of a really nice Rangers passing play that wound up on his stick and in the net. This was the first of two power play goals that came in the second period and nullified the Oilers’ lead.
• Oscar Klefbom is having a tough season. I’m just going to assume that his confidence is way down (if he’s not hurt), because he’s not at all doing the things that made him so effective last year. His gaps aren’t there and he seems to get lost more than we’re used to.
• Pat Maroon took a selfish elbow penalty that resulted in the Rick Nash power play goal. He didn’t need to give his man a bow when he wasn’t even close to the puck and the fact that it ended up giving the Rangers a lead is salt in the wound.
• The penalty kill is garbage and the Oilers can’t stay out of the box. It’s a bad combination and they finished the day allowing 2/3 while down a man.
• The NHL site had the Oilers with only 14 giveaways but that seems light to me. To me, they were giving the puck away a whole lot and it cost them in zone time. Anybody else?
• When is Darnell Nurse going to get some time on the power play? Flip him with Klefbom until Klef starts playing better.
• That version of the Canadian anthem was… interesting?
• I didn’t want to eat beets today — I really didn’t. Thanks for ruining my Saturday. As always, I’ll be posting updates on my Twitter.

SCORING SUMMARY

#GOODCONTENT