In our preview of the tactical aspect of the first-round series between the Oilers and Kings, we discussed a lot of what could occur when teams were executing their systems. We did not talk much about the physical and mental preparedness of each team coming into the series.

To end the season, the Kings were incredibly healthy. With the exception of Tanner Jeannot, the Kings had run the line-up that played game one for a few weeks. In the run-up to season’s end, you could see it in their play: they were playing fast, cohesive and confident in all game states. The Oilers, on the other hand, had battle injuries right down to the end of the season with some of their key players like McDavid, Draisaitl, Walman, Skinner and others. Some, like Mattias Ekholm, were even ruled out before the series started.

Trade deadline addition Trent Frederic, who was expected to be a top-six impact player, couldn’t play more than one game coming into the playoffs due to a high ankle sprain. All this left a team that really had not played as a team for quite some time. In game one, this substantial difference between the two teams showed up very early with the Kings racing out to a 4-0 lead. However, even before the 4-0 lead, it became clear the Oilers were starting to put it together, which started to sway the game in their favour. In the end, the 4-0 lead was too much to overcome,e eventually losing 6-5.

However, there was some good to take out of the game. There were also a lot of little things to clean up. Overall, I would imagine the coaching staff isn’t pleased with the outcome, but they might be feeling fairly optimistic about what game two could look like.

What do I mean by that? Well, let’s look at the tape.

As we said in the opening, Trent Frederic just has not played enough hockey in the last two months and more importantly, he has not done it with Edmonton. As such, he is going to play hesitantly to some degree until he understands the systems played and reads what he needs to make. In the first 5v5 goal against, you could see this crop up.

This was really a simple play that relates almost exclusively to Trent Frederic just not playing. In simple terms, he got “puck locked”. The play starts with the Oilers defending an attack using their 1-2-2 neutral zone play. Frederic is on the right side. He gets wiped out as the puck goes into the zone, so Jeff Skinner, being the next man back, goes and supports the puck.

The next thing that happens is that Skinner gets the stick taken out of his hands. Seeing this, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins slides over to help. At this point, the Oilers have three men on the wall against two Kings. That’s enough. Frederic, who’s playing this side, needs to rotate over and down to the slot to cover the weak side. He does not and the puck comes up top and moves over to his mark about 30 feet away. Trouble.

Again, this goal against will almost certainly not happen again to Frederic. He is a good defensive player. He just has not played much and almost none of it with Edmonton. He looked much better by the end of the game, although he got taken out of the game with all the penalties and empty net situations in the third. He will be better in game two.

As is typical for any NHL fanbase, whenever a goal goes in against your team, everyone loves to pin the blame on their favourite (or least favourite) player. It’s no different in Edmonton.

There were two goals last night that everyone had their favourite whipping boy. Yet, as an old coach used to say, “I can find three mistakes by three players before any puck goes in our net.”

Such was the case last night on the third goal against the Oilers. For many of you, it will surprise you to hear that the trouble started with an offensive zone faceoff win by the Oilers. This play is essentially three segments: very poor execution by the Oilers off a face-off win, very poor decision-making by Evan Bouchard on the retrieval, and then pure chaos.

Let’s start with the face-off. As we talked in the preview, the Oilers would be smart to run a lot of 2-3 offence against the Kings. This was their time and time again last night, as we will discuss shortly. In this case, off the face-off win, absolutely no forward gets themselves open for a play. Jeff Skinner literally freezes instead of coming out to the high middle or flaring to the wall. So Darnell Nurse is forced to send the puck to Evan Bouchard. He is trapped in the corner with pressure coming and no passing options. The puck gets sent to the net and misses wide. This allows the Kings to clear the puck from the zone.

Now comes segment two, which is Evan Bouchard. I’ve slowed this portion down so you can see Bouchard scanning this situation behind him. He knows where all the trouble is and the options. Why he chooses to go back against the grain, I will never know. He sends a tough pass up the wall on a side where the Kings have three checkers. In the meantime, Jeff Skinner enters the play on the weak side. It is clear, Skinner was there and unmarked. Why a rim didn’t happen is only for Evan Bouchard to know. This was a bad play.

The last segment is just chaos. The only point I will make here is that defencemen are told over and over again, the most dangerous area is the low slot in front of the net. Why both Bouchard and Nurse chose to chase behind the net, I do not understand. The Oilers could have retreated into their box plus one and just defended the net front. Neither player chose to do that and no one else was available.

There is a lot in this goal by a lot of players in a lot of zones. Given that we will talk about how the 2-3 offence got better, I suspect that part will not happen much more. Bouchard needs to think a bit more about making a simple play when he retrieving. Finally, the Oilers need to get more composed in their own zone. When struggles happen, resort to the box plus one and defend the net front.

In a similar vein, the Kings’ fourth goal had a few different issues in it. The play starts as an innocuous dump-in by the Kings. Even more innocuous was the fact that both Victor Arvidsson and Connor Brown decided to change despite the fact that the puck went into their zone. I can kinda get behind the Arvidsson change, but Brown is inexcusable. His U13 coach would have drilled this into him. This left the Oilers disadvantaged from the start.

Next, I have slowed this part down so everyone can see that Evan Bouchard is scanning the ice to find the trouble. The puck escapes Stuart Skinner and gets to Brett Kulak. Kulak reverses the puck back to Bouchard and then absolutely falls asleep getting back to the net front. Quinton Byfield has two strides on him before he even gets going. In the meantime, Bouchard has the puck. He knows that he has McDavid mirroring him. Instead of making the safe play to the corner, Bouchard tries a high-risk play to the middle of the ice. I can be critical of McDavid here as well. Centres are taught to read the play and then accelerate into space.

Here, McDavid starts going before Bouchard makes the play. He needed to make sure it went to the corner. This is a small quibble because Bouchard needed to make the safe play. The puck comes out to the front of the net. Kulak isn’t back and McDavid has left the slot expecting a pass into the corner.

Again, there were multiple issues on this play, with Evan Bouchard making the most egregious mistake of all. These are all fixable mistakes that I suspect will be cleaned up for game two.

This type of offence is available to the Oilers against the Kings at will. Edmonton didn’t start doing it until the middle of the game, but when they made it a part of their regular play, it yielded dividends. Let’s take a look at the Oilers’ first goal.

This was a 2-3 offence almost by accident. McDavid misses a pass and it goes to Bouchard. However, McDavid stays high in the zone. Watch what it does to the Kings’ defensive structure. It leaves a massive seam in the middle of the ice. When McDavid makes a tremendous tight turn, he steps into that seam. Draisaitl rotates off his check into the space and the Oilers get their first goal.

The Kings’ defensive structure can be exploited without a doubt. The 2-3 attack is one of the key ways to do it. Need more convincing? Let’s look at the third goal for the Oilers off a face-off. Watch Leon Draisaitl on the win. Instead of staying low, he creeps up high. Now watch Quinton Byfield. He floats up with him leaving a lot of space down low for a 2v2 attack. McDavid again beats his man off the turn. Corey Perry goes Corey Perry. The Oilers get their third goal.

Yes, Perry took a penalty here, but so did the Kings. McDavid had this play and there was a huge amount of space in the slot, all because Leon Draisaitl slid up the ice, bringing his check with him.

The Oilers need to make the 2-3 attack a staple of their play going forward. It can and will work.

We made much about the new neutral zone for the Los Angeles Kings. The Kings switched from a 1-3-1 trap to a 1-2-2 to be more aggressive on trying to turn pucks over. While I think this is a much better structure for the Kings’ personnel, it can be exploited. This happens when a puck gets into the middle of the square to a player who’s in flight. The Oilers created a goal off a set play against the 1-2-2, doing just this.

The play starts with Jake Walman resetting in his zone, allowing a chance to happen. Two Oiler forwards come and swing to his strong side. This leaves one Oiler up ice on the Kings’ blueline. One of the forwards who swung, Trent Frederic, comes across the middle of the ice in full flight and Walman finds him. Frederic makes a great little touch pass to get it to Jeff Skinner to allow a zone entry.

Now the Oilers, at a minimum, have a 3v3 or 2v2 attack going. The Kuemper play on this is very poor as is the net front defence by the Kings.

This goal basically spelled the end of the Kings’ fourth line. It was also a play that can be repeated against any Kings’ line, given how they are playing against the Oilers when in full control. There is a lot of space in the middle of the ice and the F1 for the Kings is really passive in his approach. If the Oilers are doing this right, we could expect to see this happen 5 or 6 times per game.

The Kings’ winning goal was a tough one, given the effort by the Oilers to drag themselves back into the game. However, it is also a lesson in how narrow the margins are in these games. The play actually starts with a threatening situation for the Oilers. Watch this face-off here.

McDavid takes it back into a 2-3 attack. Looks at the Kings’ net front. It is a 2v1 for just a second for the Oilers. If McDavid can get the puck down low, it might be trouble for the Kings. Instead, the Kings make a fantastic defensive play to stop the pass. Now watch the other split-second decision that leads to the goal. Philip Danault immediately takes off to join the attack. All Leon Draisaitl had to do was match his pace back. However, he is late to start and ultimately, it is his man who makes the play leading to the goal.

This goal is exactly why players need to be ready for every shift in the game. The margin is just too narrow between a win and a loss.

This play is going to be a familiar sight in this series. It is the sight of a tremendous backtrack effort by the Kings. This is one of the most impressive parts of this team.  Watch this play.

You can see the maniacal commitment of the Kings to tracking back on plays. Here, they actually over-commit and have three players on one, leaving a ton of space in the middle of the ice. The problem here is that no Oiler other than Leon Draisaitl is even on the screen. There needs to be more support from the team. One group that can help immensely are the defence group.

Watch what happens when the Oilers do engage in this type of tactic.

It is almost comical how available this play was for Bouchard. It was there most of the night for the Oilers. The Kings are so focused on working back on the puck that there is space on the weakside to create a royal road(puck changing sides of ice) style of attack. Now, imagine the first video we showed with a defender coming up the ice and calling for the puck. One could envision a pass to Draisaitl, who sends it across the ice. This is one area of improvement I would hope for the Oilers in game two.

As in any playoff loss, there are lots of people asking for certain players not to see the ice. I don’t think there is any doubt that Stuart Skinner needed to make some saves. Would I change the goalie at this juncture of the series? No, I don’t think so. That feels like an unnecessary Hail Mary at this point, but I can understand the sentiment.

Josh Brown wouldn’t play for me. This Kings team is not physical and they do not play a ground and pound game. They play fast and they focus on the rush. Cam Dineen fits this game more. I understand the concern about playing a rookie defender, but Josh Brown wasn’t trusted with much ice and was a culprit on the penalty kill. I think Dineen can perform better.

There is lots of rumble that Evander Kane could play and maybe did not play, because the league was watching LTIR offenders. Should Kane come back in and, assuming Frederic is healthy enough, that means someone is coming out. I am not sure who that means, but Jeff Skinner had some struggles in this game getting the puck out of his zone. He would not be my choice, but I could see it. Would also love to see more out of Victor Arvidsson.

That’s it for the Game 1 review. Hope you enjoyed it. See you Thursday.

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