Episode two of Oil Change follows the Edmonton Oilers through the first month of the 2013-14 NHL season. Most of their games in October are played on the road and, to put the experience mildly, it’s a pretty bumpy ride. But while fans might beg to differ, rookie head coach Dallas Eakins believes his team is better than their disappointing record indicates. If the players just stick to the game plan and play the way he wants them to, he’s convinced they will begin to win more games than they lose.
In this episode, viewers spend a morning off in Montreal with top center Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and his brother Adam, a student at Concordia University. They join the Oilers in celebrating their beloved, long-time dressing room attendant Joey Moss’s 50th with a laugh-filled pro wrestling show at Ryan Smyth’s house. They watch a group of the team’s young stars have some four-wheeled fun in the parking lot outside Rexall Place during a TV commercial shoot for Ford, and get a glimpse of some young prospects on the Oilers farm teams in Oklahoma City and Bakersfield chasing their NHL dreams.
This episode introduces fans to unheralded new Oilers Mark Arcobello, Will Acton and Luke Gazdic, all of whom embody the classic underdog success story. They learn about fellow rookie Anton Belov, who passed up much bigger money in the KHL this year to try to make a name for himself as an NHL defenceman, and in the process possibly earn himself an invitation to be part of Team Russia at the Sochi Olympics in February. The episode also tracks the trial and tribulations of Russian youngster Nail Yakupov, first overall pick in the 2012 NHL Entry Draft, whose struggles as an Oilers sophomore eventually make him a healthy scratch for the first time in his starry career.
