PREVIEW - Oilers at Jets
EDMONTON, AB – Continue building your game and soon, you’ll break through.
The Oilers were handed a 5-0 defeat on the road by the Winnipeg Jets in pre-season action on Monday, but there were plenty of positives for Head Coach Jay Woodcroft in what he saw from his group – most notably on the shot-suppression side over the first 40 minutes.
“I looked up while walking off and I think we gave up 15 shots after two periods,” Woodcroft said. “We were competing well, and then I thought we ran out of gas a little bit. In that third period, we started to turn the puck over and they made us pay for some mistakes. We were in the box three times that period, and it just took more and more juice out of us."
The Jets, making their home pre-season debut in the second of back-to-back games against the Oilers, dressed plenty of regulars for the crowd at Canada Life Centre in names like Kyle Connor – who was a 47-goal scorer in two seasons ago – and Mark Scheifele, Josh Morrissey and Neal Pionk.
Edmonton was led in NHL experience by defencemen Cody Ceci and Brett Kulak in the lineup, but their relatively inexperienced side was made to pay in the final period when mental and physical fatigue led to mistakes, which resulted in turnovers, penalties and plenty of room for Winnipeg to score four goals in the final frame.