LOS ANGELES — Usually, when you’ve been on the road for eight days the way the Edmonton Oilers have, you’re in your fourth or fifth city playing your fourth or fifth hockey game.
On this trip, however, the Oilers haven’t left the state of California, and they’ve only made a couple of quickie flights between Los Angeles/Anaheim and San Jose.
It seems like too many days away for too few games, honestly. Like a trip that would be awesome mid-season, but not in October, when guys want to play games.
Just talking to guys around the Oilers room, there’s been too much dead time and not enough game time.
“Sometimes it’s just easier if you play the next day, right?” agreed head coach Mike Babcock, speaking after the morning skate. “But just getting regrouped here today is important.
“This trip would be unbelievable in January or February, wouldn't it be? The temperature in Edmonton, the temperature here… But the reality is we have a game here today. We can talk about all that other stuff. It doesn't even matter.
“It's game day. We got to get right and play right.”
The theme Tuesday for Edmonton, other than trying to sweep this three-game roadie and remain the only team in the National Hockey League without a regulation loss, is that it is career game No. 800 for its captain, Connor McDavid.
McDavid’s totals through 799 games are sick: 412 goals, 821 assists and 1,233 points. That’s an average of 1.54 points per game played, a goals/60 of 1.09 and a points/60 of an incredible 2.91.
Only two players in hockey history have more points in their first 800 games than McDavid, and we bet you can guess their names: Wayne Gretzky had 1,892 points, while Mario Lemieux piled up 1,580 points in his first 800 games.
On this day, October 13, 2015, McDavid scored his first career NHL goal in a 4-2 loss at Dallas.
Cal-Lines-For-Ya
Zach Hyman was a hopeful participant tonight, but alas, he’s a no-go.
“It’s really close, I guess. But what does that mean?” asked Babcock. We expect Hyman to be in the lineup when the Oilers open a home-and-home with Utah, Thursday night at Rogers Place.
Jake Walman is out again with an undisclosed injury. He missed the last game as well, and the fact that Walman tends to spend at least a quarter of every season injured may yet become a factor in Edmonton. We’ll see.
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If the Oilers can secure at least a point tonight, it will be the third time in franchise history they’ve come out of the gates with a six-game points streak. They went 7-0 in ’83-’84, and 12-0-3 in ’84-’85.
The Kings are expected to look like this:
Panarin - Byfield - Kempe
Laferriere - Haula - Perry
Moore - Laughton - Armia
Lee - Helenius - Wright
Dumoulin - Doughty
Edmundson - Clarke
Anderson - Ceci
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Los Angeles (0-2-2) tries to avoid going winless in its first five games for the first time since 1997-98.
In L.A.’s first season post-Anze Kopitar, the struggle has been real. Through four games, the Kings rank dead last in the NHL in five-on-five goals (four), 31st on the penalty kill (56.3 per cent) and 29th in goals against per game (4.25).
They’ve spent a grand total of 10:47 with the lead this season, better only than the struggling Florida Panthers (8:40), a team with one regulation win and a couple of OT losses.
Like Edmonton on this trip, the Kings aren’t loving their light October schedule.
“We’ve had good stretches, for sure, but it’s definitely not good enough,” Scott Laughton told the local media after Monday’s practice. “I mean, you have to win hockey games, and you want to get off to a good start. But it’s hard right now too. It feels like we’ve been playing every four days, so you can’t really get in the rhythm.”
