So, practise makes perfect? After being unable to get much fine-tuning in between games thanks to a compressed, road-heavy schedule, the Edmonton Oilers put in a shutout performance Saturday. The 4-0 win over the host Seattle Kraken saw better defensive play and “much more engagement,” Oilers head coach Kris Knoblauch said Monday. “There was a lot of energy and a lot of togetherness on the bench, which I think is important,” the third-year bench boss told reporters after practice at Edmonton’s Downtown Community Arena. The win came three days after a gut-punch of an 8-3 home loss to the Dallas Stars, which itself came after a seven-game road trip that punctuated a season-beginning schedule that saw the Oilers play 16 of their first 24 games away from home. It wasn’t their only blowout defeat of the month. A Nov. 8 home date saw the Colorado Avalanche dominate Edmonton in a 9-1 decision. Knoblauch said the team had managed to get in just six or seven practice sessions over that time, while last week, coaches put players through drills three times. Now, Knoblauch said he is hoping his team can get into a “little bit of a rhythm: play, practise, play,” with their next five games on home ice at Rogers Place, starting with Tuesday’s matchup against the Minnesota Wild. “Right now, we certainly have anticipation that we’re going to play a lot better than we did in those two (against Dallas and Colorado),” he said. “I don’t see how we could play worse. The guys are ready, committed to playing some good hockey, defensively especially. (Minnesota) will be a good test.” Indeed, the Wild are one of the National Hockey League’s hottest teams, having gone 9-0-2 in their last 11 games. Only the Avalanche are hotter: they’re 13-0-3 in their last 16 games and haven’t lost in regulation time since Oct. 25. Knoblauch expects the Wild to be a tough test, of course, but also feels his team hasn’t been playing up to its standards, particularly “puck play.” “I think that should be a strength of ours,” he said. And while Oilers players point to the tough schedule, they acknowledge every other team will have such challenges, too, given the effect February’s Winter Olympics has on it. “There are no excuses,” winger Zach Hyman said. “Everyone goes through stretches like that during the year. Ours came early. Make of it what you will. We still wanted to play better on it.” Centre Adam Henrique said a key to the Oilers’ success is coming onto the ice from the beginning with “that emotion.” “You’ve got to have it right from the start, and no matter where the game goes, you’ve got to be able to continually ramp that up and play with the details that we talk about all over the ice,” he said. It’s not as though the Oilers haven’t been through this kind of adversity at this time of year before. The last two seasons saw them in a similar position record-wise – hovering around .500 and outside the playoff picture – before going on regular-season runs and ultimately making the post-season. “Our locker room has been through it before,” Hyman said. “There are expectations, but the internal expectations are even stronger.”
