MONTREAL, QC - The Oilers will look to wrap up their Eastern Conference road trip by extending their point-streaking ways in a Sunday morning contest against the Montreal Canadiens.
With a 2-0-1 start to the trip, the Oilers have now gone 11 contests since leaving the game without incremental improvement in the standings. Their excellent run of form has the team nipping at the heels of the Pacific Division leading Vegas Golden Knights, with only a single point separating the two teams in the standings.
Edmonton's success has shown they can be a multi-faceted teams over the run. The penalty kill has been superb, the goaltending has been more than solid, and they are getting goal contributions from nearly everyone in the lineup. Even with all the recent success, Oilers Head Coach Jay Woodcroft continues to focus on refining the little details as Edmonton strives to find themselves among the NHL's elite.
"What we try and do is model a level of consistency in how we coach. We take every day as it comes, and we don't try and get too far ahead of ourselves. We honestly and clearly look at themes that are representing themselves in our team game, where we can improve, and we try and build a game plan off those themes that we're seeing," Woodcroft said. "Obviously, you have to pay attention to what the other team is doing because that might affect some things, but I think our team is in a pretty decent rhythm right now. Most importantly, we understand the value of points. And as I said, that's the business we're in. We're in the business of trying to collect as many points as we can."
Woodcroft seems to be pulling the strings in all the right ways lately. With his 11-and-7 alignment, the Oilers have been forced to sit NHL calibre forwards on a nightly basis, but he has made that work in his favour. Warren Foegele was scratched the game before the All-Star break and responded with a goal in his first game back in the lineup.
In his stead, it was Jesse Puljujarvi's turn to watch the game from the press box. The Finn notched the game winning goal against the Ottawa Senators on Saturday, much to the delight of the Oilers bench.
"When we go 11-and-7 there's a lot of benefits to it. One of the hard things about it is that it means some good forwards don't get in the lineup. That's through no issue of his or anything like that," Woodcroft said. "Tonight we felt we wanted to insert Jesse back into the lineup and he went out there and scored a huge goal. His teammates and his coaching staff are super excited for him. It's a huge goal for our team and I thought he played a really good game."
