Edmonton vs. Minnesota live blog

The Bee Movie Keys To The Game:

Minnesota: Score first, work the cycle, force turnovers.

Edmonton: Avoid, at all cost, scoring the games' first three goals in the first five minutes.

7:51 pm update: DAMMIT.

8:18 pm update: 3-1 lead, after the Wild scored their first (another lucky bounce) they clamped down pretty good. Calgary's not doing their part, yet...

8:41 pm update: 4-1, Brodziak off the Josh Harding giveaway. It's lame to say these things after the fact but as soon as the puck came to Harding, on a missed pass to Stortini up the middle, I had a feeling he was going to give it away. Maybe because he'd given the puck away on an earlier shift. Now 4-2 Wild on a long point shot; Roloson isn't getting many shots and while the ones he's getting aren't easy, he has to make some saves. 1-0 Avs too, get your act together Flamers.

9:11 pm update: 5-2 at the intermission, Cogliano off a beautiful pass from Gagner. 1-0 for Colorado over Calgary; Avs have a .862 winning percentage when leading going into the third period. Odds are against the Oilers gaining ground tonight, especially given their cursed three goal lead, but long odds have favored them lately.

I think it's interesting that, for a lot of the year, Andrew Cogliano was the rookie described as having a Todd Marchant-type ceiling, if a little more scoring touch. Cogliano heard that, said Yeah Right, and started scoring overtime winners like Jack Nicolson scores add-on jokes from Oscar hosts. The player who might fit the Marchant comparison better, to me, is Kyle Brodziak. This guy's a player; beautiful play in traffic to accept a pass then splits the defense for a breakaway. Like Marchant though, he's hit-or-miss on those breakaways and yet seems to get them ALL the time. He kills penalties, scores those tack-on goals that matter so much, blocks shots, forechecks well and doesn't get a lot of attention. He's certainly bigger and more physical than Marchant, but otherwise they're pretty similar players. They're not necessarily the same in style or appearance, but I really think their impact on the game is similar.

10:04 pm update: 5-3 final in Edmonton, 2-0 final in Denver. Stupid Flames. Oilers now three back of Colorado and Vancouver (Canucks have two games in hand) and they're in 9th place. Pretty good night, short of great but winning is always Super Terrific Good!

Sigh...

Yeah, thought so. It's not that Roloson played badly, but it was a game that he would've needed to steal with Luongo at the other end. At this stage in his career, he's just not likely to elevate his game to that kind of level, though very few can. Garon has done that this year, though with him it's a question of whether he can do it for very long. They lost because their powerplay, one whose performance against Phoenix on Tuesday would have been the envy of any team in the league, looked much more like the powerplay of earlier this season. Credit to the Canucks too, their penalty killing was more aggressive than the Coyotes', a smart tactic since the Oilers didn't show much pace or quickness on any of their powerplays. Last chance on Saturday night, a loss then at that's really it. Let's not forget the main goal of this season though, a slogan that might not sell season tickets or generate optimism but certainly has some urgency: Make Anaheim's Draft Pick Worse. The 2007-2008 Oilers, feel the excitement!

I WANT this to be the right call, but...

Game of the year for the Oilers tonight, and HERE'S the starting goalie. Rollie had an incredible weekend against Phoenix and San Jose but looked, I thought, rather ordinary against Phoenix on Tuesday. This a pure MacTavish decision, a people decision rather than a hockey one since Garon has better numbers and has beaten Luongo three times already this year. Still, MacT's people decisions got them to the finals so maybe this works out. I hope it does obviously and success with Roloson for me is far more encouraging than with Garon just for the fact that until this season, Garon's been an average goalie while Roloson's been an All-Star and won a Stan OH WAIT, no he didn't because Marc-Andre Bergeron hates the Oilers, pushes over the elderly in the street and mugs Girl Scouts. With the Canucks icing a goon squad, maybe MacTavish is counting on the fact that Rollie can draw more goaltender interference calls than Garon. A good guess, since Rollie can draw those kinds of penalties whenever he feels like it, even in July if he wants. With talk of an 84 game schedule and an Olympic year on the horizon, he might have to do that for the Oilers to win a Cup.

A Child's Laughter!

Last week, on a lark, I wrote an email question to Hall of Fame sportswriter Jim Matheson of the Edmonton Journal as part of his weekly Q and A thingy. I still get unduly excited by the hockey celebrity culture in Edmonton, surely as a result of moving away when I was thirteen. I guess my fandom is frozen at that age. Even at twenty-six, an autograph from 18-year-old Sam Gagner would make me unreasonably excited. I still carry that sense of a large, impenetrable barrier between fans and players/media, even though the reality is that you can run into an Oiler pretty easily in this town. I can't, but others seem to. Anyways, it was with great excitement that today's Journal saw my question published and answered by the great Mr. Matheson. A pretty bland question on my part, but I wanted to get published so I tried to sound like the 13 year-old I still act like. Mine's the last question.

Not one of my deeper NHL thoughts, but his answer is pretty long. He mentions that Wade Belak, Todd Fedoruk and Darcy Hordichuk might be players the Oilers look at for some, you guessed it, MUCH NEEDED GRIT! No, he doesn't actually say that but "toughness," "character" and "nuclear deterrent" are the same thing. Phrases like "nuclear deterrent" are why Jim Matheson is a Hall of Fame writer.

I also flipped to Sportsnet.ca this morning and looked under the "The Wire" section when what did I see? A link titled "Belak could be on Oilers' wish list" and linking to the Matheson article. I can now truly say that I've gone beyond my own blog to contribute to the superfluous self-referencing nature of the internet. So, when the NHL's free agency period starts on July 1 and the big news is Wade Belak's signing with the Oilers, you'll know which no-longer anonymous fan broke the story. Or rather, which no-longer anonymous fan wrote a bland, simplistic, childlike email to his local newspaper which PROMPTED Hall of Fame sportswriter Jim Matheson to break the story on his own.

My own thoughts are that the Oilers toughness issues this year, completely forgotten now and seemingly conquered earlier this year just before Moreau got hurt, were largely a result of who's missing. Torres and Souray represent a lot of missing hits and cycle-breaking and Horcoff, while not in that category, contributes more of a sacrificial toughness: blocking shots, taking hits to make plays, comes out of the corner with the puck. Moreau's presence seemingly made everyone tougher since this team got a lot harder to play against when he came back, though that took time to grow. As a result, Kevin Lowe, I'm guessing, is more likely not to add any "nuclear deterrents" this summer. If he does then somebody, maybe Torres as part of a package, will be gone to clear roster and cap space. I'd love to see Georges Laraque come back, and if not him then another heavyweight because in this division "nuclear deterrents" should be taken literally: Minnesota has THREE heavyweights in their lineup, Calgary and Vancouver have pushed Edmonton around this year, and Colorado has, um, Ian Laperriere. Unless Lowe makes a splash and gets Hossa (unlikely), Naslund (foolish, too old) or pries Sakic or Sundin out of their cushy captaincies, the team you see now is the one going forward. Given the last few weeks, that's a pretty good thing.

Stupid Oilers II

Pretty good, have to say. There's hope now! No, no. Settle down. Five points out still, nothing to get excited about yet. Now, a win against Vancouver...