At least we all have the rest of the day to stop being angry. Final Score: 5-1 Stars
Coming into today’s game all I could really hope for was that the Oilers showed up ready to play. When they do, the boys always have a reasonable chance at winning, but getting a quick start has seemed to happen about as regularly as a solar eclipse. I mean, I wrote about it two or three times in this morning’s GDB, and it’s annoying that this is still something that we have to talk about, but the Oilers can’t seem to put together a full 60 minutes worth of effort. Case and point, the 3-0 hole they dug for themselves before the first period was over.
It doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to figure out that spotting a team three goals in the first period is a bad idea. The Jamie Benn line could basically do whatever they wanted in the Oilers’ zone and, frankly, the visitors were lucky they didn’t do any more damage than the four goals. But at the end of the day, it really didn’t matter who the Stars threw over the boards, the Oilers couldn’t get anything done offensively and were a mess more often than not in their own end. It was a mess from start to finish, and aside from a few momentary highs, there’s not a lot of positives to take away from this game. All you can do is flush is and move on.
See you guys tomorrow.
The wrap.

THE BRIGHT SIDE

  • That game is over.
  • Leon Draisaitl got the Oilers on the board with a third period power play goal that was assisted by both Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Connor McDavid. Todd McLellan loaded up that first unit with his three big centremen and it paid off with a PP goal today. How weird is it that it took until game 42 for Draisaitl to score his first power play marker of the season? I mean, it was too little too late but we’ll take it anyway.
  • Shout out to Al Montoya for making his Oilers debut after not even having the luxury of a single practice before being called upon. He came into the game in a tough spot and did a decent job of stopping the bleeding. He made 13 saves on the day and finished with a .929 save%.
  • The Oilers not only scored a power play goal but also didn’t allow anything on the penalty kill either. How’s that for strange?
  • At least Pitlick didn’t score?

THE FACE PALMERS

  • That first period could be one of the ugliest pieces of work the Oilers have put in all season. Brutal.
  • Radulov opened the scoring for the Stars after Klefbom pinched at the opposing blue line without any cover and Dallas walked in on a clear 2-on-1 that Cam Talbot had no chance on. Not a great time to pinch by Klefbom.
  • Jamie Benn put the Stars up by two goals after somehow finding his way into open ice, right in front of the net. Nuge lost his man (Benn) and no one was able to stop Radulov from dangling in the zone until he found Benn wide open at the side of the net.
  • The Stars’ first line continued to make life miserable when Tyler Seguin added a third first-period goal to put the Oilers down by three and send the fanbase looking for other things to do.
  • The day of sadness continued just under six minutes into the second period as Mattias Janmark added a fourth goal to the board and got Cam Talbot pulled from the game.
  • Tyler Seguin (he had a hell of a game btw, who would ever think of trading him) was able to hang on to the puck, circling the net until he found John Klingberg walking in from the point. Seguin made a perfect pass and Klingberg beat Montoya with a quick wrister.
  • Cam Talbot got the hook (mercy pull imo) after allowing four goals on 19 shots. Obviously, that’s not the kind of start that he would have wanted but it’s not like he had much help in front of him either. The Oilers were absolutely awful and I’m not hanging this loss on Talbot at all. Yeah, he could have a couple of them, maybe, but maybe everyone else could have worked towards not leaving him out to dry either.
  • Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Leon Draisaitl share the green jacket with a -3 on the afternoon.
  • The Oilers were 39% in the faceoff circle after being so good in the past few nights. Brutal effort all around.
  • Everyone was bad and should feel bad.
  • I really, really didn’t want to do a #BeetCast today. There’s something about eating beets in the daylight that makes them even more offensive to me. Even worse is that I now have to leave the house to get more just in case I have to do this crap all over again tomorrow. FML. The #BeetCast, as always, is happening now on my Twitter.

SCORING SUMMARY

1ST PERIOD

TIMETEAMDETAILSSCORE
10:21
Dallas
Alexander Radulov (16) ASST: Tyler Seguin (18), John Klingberg (32)
0-1
12:54
Dallas
Jamie Benn (17) ASST: Alexander Radulov (21)
0-2
16:32
Dallas
Tyler Seguin (21) ASST: Alexander Radulov (22), John Klingberg (33)
0-3

2ND PERIOD

TIMETEAMDETAILSSCORE
04:27
Dallas
Mattias Janmark (10)
0-4

3RD PERIOD

TIMETEAMDETAILSSCORE
02:04
Edmonton
PPG – Leon Draisaitl (11) ASST: Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (15), Connor McDavid (33)
1-4
10:04
Dallas
John Klingberg (6) ASST: Tyler Seguin (19), Mattias Janmark (13)
1-5

#GOODCONTENT

Talk to me, Twitter. Tweet at @OilersNation and @jsbmbaggedmilk for your chance to land in the Best of the Tweets.

THE REAL LIFE PODCAST

On this week’s Real Life Podcast, the boys talk about what the hell happened in the two weeks since our last episode, what would it take to get Erik Karlsson out of Ottawa, and wonder where the team will go from here.
Source: NHL, Official Game Page, 01/06/2018 – 3:30pm MST