The Edmonton Oilers were in the NHL “playoffs” for a total of seven days. After a five-month break, due to COVID-19, they returned to their home city, with no fans in attendance, and lost to the 12th place Chicago Blackhawks in four games.

Even though the Oilers had only made the playoffs once in the previous 13 seasons, for many in Oilersnation this series lose stung much more than any of the previous 12 losing seasons.

There were many reasons to believe the Oilers would be preparing for another opponent today. Instead the focus will be on tonight’s draft lottery where the Oilers, along with Florida, Minnesota, Nashville, New York (Rangers), Pittsburgh, Toronto and Winnipeg, each have a 12.5% chance to win the lottery and land the #1 spot in the draft. If they win, that will soften the blow of exiting the playoffs after four games somewhat, but if they pick 14th (where they will pick if they lose, or 15th if Pittsburgh wins), there will be no joy in the Nation.

From my perch, I think it was clear why they lost. But before we get to that, I want to point out why I disagree with some of the reasons I’ve seen written about why they lost.

They did not lose because they couldn’t score. Only Chicago and Calgary averaged more goals/game in the qualifying round. Chicago outscored the Oilers 16-15 in the series.

Connor McDavid scored five goals, the most of any player in the playoffs.

But their depth wasn’t the problem.

Edmonton had seven forwards score at least one goal, and four of them scored two or more.

Only Arizona (9) and Calgary (10) had more forwards with at least one goal. Calgary was the only team to have more multiple goal scorers. They had five.

Scoring was not an issue. Depth scoring was not an issue. Any suggestion it was is misleading.

First off, they only played 17 minutes against each other at 5×5. And they were even. Each team scored twice when they were on the ice head-to-head.

Here is what each player did in the series.

Here are some of their 5×5 stats.

McDavid was better in every stat except goals. Goals, of course, are very important, and Toews’ on-ice Sv% was .920, while McDavid’s was .852%.

On other stat Toews was better at was faceoffs. He won 55% overall while McDavid was only 43%. They went head-to-head 24 times and Toews won 13 of them.

1. Goaltending.
2. Defensive play.
3. Lost too many key battles and lacked intensity.
4. Didn’t go with who got them to the dance.

1. You won’t win in the playoffs allowing four goals/game and allowing 16 goals on 122 shots. Edmonton actually outshot Chicago by an average of 34.3-30.5/game, but still lost.

Mikko Koskinen allowed 11 goals on 99 shots in 208 minutes of play. He didn’t allow horrible goals, but he didn’t make enough stops. Mike Smith only played 26 minutes, and outside of the screw up on the first goal, he too didn’t allow a horrible goal. But neither made a major key save, with Koskinen being the biggest culprit as he played 89% of the series.

2. They were way too soft and leaky defensively at key times. Major turnovers or bad decisions led to goals. Oscar Klefbom struggled and bad decisions led directly to three goals against. Darnell Nurse didn’t make life tough enough for Blackhawks forwards. He is the emotional leader on the blueline and didn’t bring enough of it. “The most intensity we had was the exhibition game against Calgary. It shouldn’t matter who we play, but we lacked it. I needed to bring more,” Nurse said after losing game four. At least he acknowledged it was lacking.

Ethan Bear lost some key battles. He is a rookie. They are hard lessons, and he will grow from it, but when your top three defenders don’t play as well as they did in the regular season, it is difficult to win.

3. Where was the emotion? The intensity? The Blackhawks wanted to play an emotionless series and Edmonton obliged. The Hawks are a smaller team. They don’t like to play physical and the Oilers agreed. It cost them the series. The only scrum of the series occurred after the final whistle.

Unacceptable. It is disappointing because the Oilers core played in 2017 and they should have known you need to be engaged emotionally to win. Not enough urgency or intensity cost them. If you go back and look at the goals against, how many of Chicago’s goals came directly from losing a puck battles? I counted five. Chicago scored more ugly goals.

4. I think Dave Tippett made a lot of great decisions all season. The Oilers were much more attentive to details in the second half of the season. However, I felt he didn’t go down swinging with the guys who got him to the dance. The line of Ryan Nugent-Hopkins/Leon Draisaitl/Kailer Yamamoto was incredible in 2020. They carried the team, even when McDavid missed six games.

He split up the line for the final two games of the regular season. They lost the final two regular season games and three of four v. the Blackhawks.

When Tyler Ennis was injured in game three it made it even more obvious Tippett could reunite them and slide James Neal or Andreas Athanasiou with McDavid.

But Tippett never did. He didn’t put them together until the final eight minutes of the third period. It was too late.

I asked him why he never put them together sooner?

“You can’t expect to win by being a one line team. If we want to be good long term we will need depth throughout the lineup,” he said.

I agree about long term, but this is the playoffs. It is about now, not the future.

And the fact is you CAN win in the playoffs with one line. The Blackhawks did. Toews’ line scored nine of the 13 goals scored by their forwards. In a short series one line definitely can carry you.

And I said I would have started Mike Smith in game four. I get all the numbers, but the fact is down the stretch he won 12 of his 19 starts, while Koskinen won four of his 10. I have no idea if the Oilers would have won with Smith, but I’m a big believer in you go with what got you there.

I’d have played Smith and re-united the Draisaitl trio.

The Oilers didn’t get dominated by the Hawks. Far from it actually, but they lost.

Sometimes you lose, even when the opposition doesn’t out play you, but I don’t believe they brought enough intensity and work ethic to win. They allowed the Hawks to remain in games.

Edmonton scored on their first shot of the game three times. But they only took advantage of that in game two. In game one and four after scoring first, they didn’t attack.

This will be a bitter off-season. The next two months will be painful for Oilers fans as they watch the playoffs in their city without their team. What a kick in the junk.

In the coming weeks and months we will look at many options and potential changes for this team. I don’t expect Ken Holland to blow it up. But he will need to tweak some things, and there might be one major decision he needs to make.

Tonight could have a major impact on the season. If the Oilers shockingly win the lottery, then their search for a scoring winger becomes much easier.

Regardless of what moves Holland makes, the players who return next season should be angry, because they gave away a series to the Hawks. This is a series they should have won.