How will D.J. Smith deploy the Oilers defence? |
The Edmonton Oilers currently have ten defensemen who played NHL games last season.
Most would agree the top five D-men are Evan Bouchard, Mattias Ekholm, Jake Walman, Connor Murphy, and Ryan Shea. Bouchard is their top-pair right defenceman, will run the power play, and he will play the most minutes. Murphy is the second-pair right D-man and will anchor the first penalty kill unit. Those are the only two spots in the lineup I feel are locks when training camp begins. How will D.J. Smith deploy the rest of his defence corps?
Ekholm, Walman, and Shea are the top three left defenders. Shea was on the top penalty kill unit in Pittsburgh last season, and they had the sixth-best penalty kill in the league. He will be part of the Oilers’ penalty kill, but we aren’t sure if he will be paired with Murphy.
Shea thrives on defending. “Being a good defender is mostly about being competitive,” said Shea last week on my show on Sports 1440. “You have to compete, but I also feel I have a good stick, and I can defend well with my stick and body. I hate getting scored on, and I take a lot of pride in not getting outscored.”
Ekholm is getting older, and this is the first year of his new three-year, $4 million AAV deal. At some point during this contract, he won’t be the top-pair LD, but will that happen this season? Bouchard played 1465 minutes at five-on-five last season, and he played 1215 minutes with Ekholm. He played 119 with Darnell Nurse and 59 minutes with Walman. Bouchard was paired with Ekholm for 83 per cent of his minutes and in the playoffs, it dipped to 76 per cent (82 of 108). But D.J. Smith wasn’t the head coach. With a shorter training camp and only four preseason games, and a maximum of two games for veterans with 100 games of experience, I could see Smith starting the season with the Ekholm/Bouchard pairing.
Who will play with Murphy at 5×5? Last year Murphy and Nurse emerged as a very good pair, especially in the playoffs. Murphy is your classic second pair, defensive-minded, first unit penalty kill defender. Will Smith
Smith coached Bouchard at the World Championships. He raved about Bouchard’s game, but I don’t expect Bouchard to average 24:41/game this season. Bouchard led Oilers D-men with 147 minutes on the PK last year. Don’t expect that this season. Head coach Mike Babcock has stated his top guys won’t play as much, and removing Bouchard from the penalty kill is an easy way to lower his minutes. He averaged 1:48/game and if that drops down to about :30 then Bouchard will average around 23 minutes/game, which makes sense.
I don’t need Bouchard on the penalty kill. I’d play Murphy and Ty Emberson, or whoever is the third pair RD. It’s not that Bouchard can’t do it, but moreso he doesn’t need to. And if we look at how D.J. Smith deployed his blueliners last season, it seems obvious Bouchard won’t be on the top two PK units.
The Kings blueline was very healthy last season with Brian Dumoulin, Cody Ceci, Joel........