PREVIEW: Oilers vs. Utah

The Edmonton Oilers ring in the new year with the first-ever visit to Rogers Place from Utah Hockey Club on New Year's Eve.

You can watch the game on Sportsnet at 7:00 MT or listen live on the Oilers Radio Network, including 880 CHED.

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PREVIEW: Oilers vs. Utah

EDMONTON, AB – Puck drop, then ball drop.

The Edmonton Oilers will close out 2024 on New Year's Eve with the first-ever visit from Utah Hockey Club to Rogers Place, looking to bounce back from back-to-back defeats this past weekend in California against the NHL's newest franchise.

The Oilers are 2-2-1 in their last five games on Dec. 31 dating back to 2018 and will play on the final day of the year for the fourth straight season. Leon Draisaitl (4G, 6A) has the most points in Oilers franchise history on New Year’s Eve, but the Blue & Orange as a franchise have struggled with a 4-15-4 record (one tie) over 25 games on the date.

Tuesday’s opponents for the Oilers will had their seven-game road winning streak snapped on Monday in a 5-2 loss to the Seattle Kraken. Utah is 11-7-2 on the road this season – compared to just 5-7-4 on home ice – and holds an 8-4-3 record over their last 15 games that includes a 4-3 overtime loss to the Oilers in their inaugural meeting back on Nov. 29 at the Delta Center in Salt Lake City.

Back in their first meeting, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins buried the game-winner blocker side on goaltender Karel Vejmelka 1:18 into sudden death. Both Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl scored on the power play in the victory to give their team multiple PP goals for the first time this season following some early special-teams struggles from the Blue & Orange.

Goaltender Calvin Pickard won the first of four straight games that night vs. Utah with 28 saves, but that win streak ended for the 32-year-old on Sunday afternoon in Anaheim after Edmonton let off the gas in the final 30 minutes despite holding a two-goal lead.

The Oilers are coming off back-to-back weekend losses in California and will be hoping not to drop any more points after having two second-period leads against Los Angeles and Anaheim turned into defeats.

“We definitely let some stuff get away,” captain Connor McDavid said after Monday’s practice at Rogers Place. “The LA game was two good teams going at it. I thought it was a pretty good game that could’ve gone either way, and then last game, we had it under control and just let them back in.”

After the Oilers took a 3-1 lead on Sunday with Leon Draisaitl’s league-leading 26^th goal, his second PPG of the game, their special-teams dominance didn’t translate to any success at even strength over the final one-and-a-half periods, where the Ducks dominated the rest of the way with four unanswered goals.

Former Oilers forward Ryan Strome’s reviewed goal with over three minutes remaining in regulation crossed the goal line to give the Ducks a late lead before Mason McTavish added an empty-netter, sealing the 5-3 victory for the Ducks and a frustrating final half for the Oilers in Orange County.

Edmonton finished 2-for-3 on the power play and 4-for-4 on the penalty kill on Sunday, but was limited to only 23 shots (18 at five-on-five) over the full 60 minutes against Anaheim – an anomaly when you consider that the Oilers are averaging the second-most shots per game (31.8) in the NHL.

Despite that, the Oilers still gave credit where it was due, and the Ducks deserved it with how they controlled them at even strength.

“I think that we just stopped working hard,” Head Coach Kris Knoblauch said. “We were up 2-0 and they didn't get their first chance until we scored our second goal. After that, they had plenty of chances, and they woke up.

“From my point of view, we relaxed and didn't play as hard as we needed to; we didn't respect them as much as we needed to. They've got a young team, plays hard, and they're going to be a really good team. But for us, I just think we took them lightly.”

“I thought we did enough good things to get a lead,” McDavid added. “But we didn't do enough to close it up.”

The defeat ended Edmonton’s seven-game winning streak against the Ducks and gave them one of a possible four points on the road trip after they won 11 of their last 13 games (11-2-0) before the holiday break.

“I think our game was going pretty well before the break and it kind of interrupted that, but just little things with our details – puck management, just moving our feet a little bit quicker, giving away time and space so we don't have to defend as much – we can create some more turnovers and just get a little bit better everywhere,” McDavid said.

Forward Connor Brown continued his strong stretch of production on Sunday with an assist on Evan Bouchard's second-period goal that gave him eight points (3G, 5A) in his last eight games and 15 points (5G, 10) over his last 21 games after registering just one goal in his first 13 appearances this season.

The 30-year-old winger has been finding ways to contribute from a bottom-six role at both even strength and the penalty kill (two shorthanded points) and could see more opportunities arise from his solid stretch of play that's marked a monumental return for Brown to his goalscoring ways that saw him produce 10 goals and 35 points in five previous NHL seasons with Toronto and Ottawa.

"He's been playing really well and got off to a slow start," Knoblauch said. "I think he had one goal and zero assists in his first 13 games. Since then, he's been. I think he's got 16 points now, so 15 points in his last 23 games, and those are all even-strength or shorthanded points. Through this stretch, I think he's had two games with Leon and zero with Connor, so for a guy playing 12 to 13 minutes a night and producing at that rate, he's a guy that we could elevate or move up in the lineup.

Jeff Skinner continues to work on his game after serving as the healthy scratch for the Oilers on Sunday against Anaheim, with the veteran forward moving around the lineup and having six goals and six assists in 34 games this season since signing a one-year, $3 million contract in Edmonton last summer.

"I think you just work on little things," Skinner said. "Different parts of your game need work, and that's why we practice because there's always something to work on. There's always something that's feeling good. There's always something that's feeling a little bit off. You just got to work at little things.

"I've been around long enough to have a pretty good feel for these kinds of things. So as a player, you just focus on working hard, doing your job, getting better every day and trying to contribute to the team the best way you can."

Coach Knoblauch said the decision on who to keep out of the lineup is always a difficult one, but with the team's current form and other players like Connor Brown, Vasily Podkolzin, Kasperi Kapanen and Derek Ryan having the ability to fill depth scoring and penalty-killing roles, Skinner was the odd man out.

"We have a group that's been playing really well, and you look at the players that we have, it's been a difficult decision whoever we took out," Knoblauch said. "We've been taking out Derek Ryan and if you look before Christmas, we had a lead late in the game against Ottawa, who had been playing really well, and I trust him on the ice and some other guys that might look to be scratches, but they're playing really well."

Knoblauch added: "I think Jeff's done a great job of learning our systems and playing hard and trying to do things the right way, and I have no issues with that. I think it's just a lot of him finding this game, and a lot of it is confidence. In some of it, a coach can nudge a player to get that confidence, but a lot of it's on the player."