Edmonton aces must step up their defensive play for Oilers to beat Los Angeles Kings

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The Edmonton Oilers are averaging more than four goals per game against the Los Angeles Kings, more than enough to beat them if Edmonton can play smart, focused and intense defensive hockey.

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The rub is that Edmonton hasn’t always played that kind of defensive hockey in its first five games, and that’s why they find themselves down three games to two, with a chance the Kings will eliminate them from the playoffs tonight in LA

Edmonton is getting strong defensive efforts from a number of top players, starting with d-men Cody Ceci and Brett Kulak, third line fixtures Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Derek Ryan, checking wingers Zack Kassian, Warren Foegele and Josh Archibald, second line winger Kailer Yamamoto, and also top line center Connor McDavid, even if he was unable to foil Adrian Kempe on LA’s winning goal in overtime on Wednesday.

No player is perfect on defense, but all these Oilers have been playing well in their own zone, generally staying on the right side of their check, cutting off shooting and passing lanes and limiting major mistakes. Ceci and RNH have been particularly good.

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Not so good?

Duncan Keith, Darnell Nurse (suspended for Game Six), Evan Bouchard, Evander Kane, Jesse Puljujarvi, Ryan McLeod and Leon Draisaitl all need to crank it up considerably. They all need to make better reads, make safer plays and make sure they cover off their position in the d-zone. For example, Draisaitl lost his check on LA’s first goal against on Wednesday, then was twice seen charging out of the zone just as the Kings were charging into it on turnover goals ignited by errant passes from Keith and Kulak.

Draisaitl’s struggles on defense were so pronounced that I was relieved when Oilers coach Jay Woodcroft put him on the wing with Connor McDavid in the third period, leaving the heavy lifting at center to McD.

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All of these players are now struggling and making too many major mistakes at even strength, but all can play solid defense. They simply have to commit to fundamental play, get focused and cut down on their bad reads.

The second and third games of this series might well have convinced the Oilers that they can beat LA on pure scoring skill, but that’s not going to happen.

To win in Los Angeles, every Oilers player must bring his “A” game on defense.

One troubling aspect of this series is that Edmonton just played its weakest defensive game, giving up 21 Grade A shots (20%+ chance of going in) and a subset of thirteen 5-alarm shots (33%+ chance of going in).

In the four games before that, Edmonton had only given up 45 Grade As and 23 5-alarm shots.

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Edmonton is almost assured of victory if they can keep the Grade A shots below eight and the subset of 5-alarm shots below five. That should be the goal, that should be the focus, tough, smart, committed fundamental defensive play from everyone on the roster, from McDavid and Draisaitl to Ceci and Keith.

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