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G71 Oilers vs Canucks: The Setting Sun
March 18, 2017, 3:49 PM ET [33 Comments]
Matt Henderson
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Oh how the tables have turned! The godless Canucks are in a place familiar to Oiler fans, near the bottom of the league standings while the Oilers are surging towards the playoffs. I’m not going to gloat, but I will boast about how much better the Oilers are doing with the expressed purpose of making the Canucks appear worse. Wait, that’s gloating. OK, I’m going to gloat.

Over this past decade I would say that it has been Vancouver who has been one of Edmonton’s top rivals – even more so than Calgary. That’s because the Canucks actually mattered for the majority of the past ten years. They were a good team for a long time and the twin drivers of that club were Henrik and Daniel Sedin. Unfortunately for Vancouver, everybody gets old eventually.

The Sedins are now 36 years old with 1 year remaining on their contracts at a combined 14 million dollar cap hit. They are not the players they once were, but man when they were in their prime they were a handful. The duo of Henrik and Daniel came into the league well before the Oilers started their tailspin, but it was roughly the time that the Oil started to flounder that they hit their prime.

From the 2005-2006 season after the lockout to the lockout shortened 2012-2013 Vancouver’s deadly duo were one of the league’s most dominant pairs offensively. Henrik Sedin didn’t miss a single game, 622 over that time, and over that stretch Hank and his brother Daniel combined for 368-885-1253. I can’t speak for all Oiler fans but, for me, vintage Daniel and Henrik are on the power play and absolutely abusing the Edmonton penalty kill.

Perhaps that’s vintage Sedin to me because Henrik has more points against the Oilers than any other team in the NHL and Daniel has only scored more against one other club. Henrik has 89GP, 17-64-81 against the Oil and Daniel has 86GP, 36-44-80. They really have taken Edmonton’s lunch money over the years. At 36 years old they aren’t the same danger they used to be, but Hank and Dan are still capable of a little magic I’m sure.

Today, Henrik is on pace for his first sub-50 point season (in a full 82 game schedule) in 13 years. Daniel hasn’t even crossed the 40 point plateau yet this year. This probably isnt the end of the Sedins. They have game left in their legs, but the end is in sight. It’s coming fast. They’ll be 37 years old to start the next year and they aren’t getting another big payday in the NHL after this contract.

Of course, that’s bad news for the Canucks in their attempts to win games. They were able to keep the club pushing forward for a long time, but the same sun that is setting on the Sedins is setting on the Vancouver Canucks. They cannot be separated from each other. Whether they want to admit it or not, the Canucks will have to rebuild before they rise up again. They will need to replace, not who the Sedins are, but who they were. That’s going to take some time, some luck, and probably a lot of losses.

Been there, Vancouver. Done that. It’s awful, but now it’s Edmonton’s turn to rise and yours to fall. If you win tonight then good for you, but chances are your fans would rather take some exciting last placed hockey over the points in the standings. Teams rise and fall. Players rise and fall. Vancouver’s window opened and closed, and it will open again one day. The Oilers window is opening now.

LINEUP

Let’s assume it stays the same.

Maroon McDavid Draisaitl
Lucic RNH Eberle
Pouliot Desharnais Kassian
Caggiula Letestu Slepyshev

Klefbom Larsson
Sekera Russell
Nurse Benning

Talbot
Brossoit

OILERS KEYS TO THE GAME

1) Is There Anything Left? The Oilers have scored 14 goals in their last 2 games. The explosion of offense has been incredible to watch, if nothing else. The team is feeling itself, creatively right now. Confidence is surging through all four lines right now, but when things start to come easy the bottom can fall out pretty quickly. All it takes for a still young team is that a little complacency seeps into their game and then those goals are going to dry up fast. The good news for the Oilers is that Connor McDavid knows very much that he’s in a scoring race with only a handful of games to go in the schedule. If there’s anybody going to be pushing like hell for offense, it’s going to be the young Captain of the Oil.

2) Rotten Penalty Kill. The Oilers have been pushing forward on the Power Play, but letting things get off the rails on the PK. After an initial hot start on the PK, this team has really faltered. Since January 1st, the Oilers are 29th in the NHL with a 74% efficiency on their penalty kill. This is an ugly stat. The good news is that the return of Benoit Pouliot also means the return of one of their best penalty killers. He is a leader in goals against per 60, Fenwick against per 60, and Corsi against per 60. If the Oilers want to work their way out of the funk they’re in on the PK then they should consider throwing Pouliot over the boards more frequently. His particular skills make for good tools on the PK. He’s fast, can be physical, and strips the puck from the opposition very well. Ironically, the ferocity with which he attacks the puck carrier also leads to penalties. Tough to kill a PK when you’re the one in the box.

3) Lil D. David Desharnais has been a significantly better addition than I originally anticipated. The Oilers got a player who had 10 points in 31 games and who looked like he was on his last legs. Since joining the team, Desharnais has 4 points in 6 games and looks like he has all kinds of jump left in those legs. I don’t know what the Habs were doing to keep him shackled down, but the anchor stayed in Quebec. If he keeps playing this well then the Peter Chiarelli is going to want to offer him a contract for next season. If this is the David Desharnais we can expect every night, then I’m happy to see him be the fulltime 3C moving forward.

Puck drops tonight at 8PM Mountain Time on Hockey Night in Canada. Game On!