TORONTO — Was it inevitable that Tristan Jarry would play in Edmonton again?
Like, who plays junior in a town, gets drafted by an American team 3,400 km away, but buys a home just outside Edmonton anyhow?
Jarry could have set his family up anywhere he wanted, but he picked an acreage near Edmonton to call home every summer — and now in winter too.
“Just my time playing there with Oil Kings, I enjoyed it so much,” Jarry said Saturday morning, a few hours before his first start of the Edmonton Oilers ‘Tristan Jarry era’. “I have a lot of friends there, and I kind of grew up there a little bit. So when I had the opportunity to buy a home, that was where I decided to set roots.”
Jarry’s wife is from Detroit, and together they have an eight-month-old son.
Now, after a decade spent in Pittsburgh, they’ll raise that boy in Oil Country, as hockey comes full circle for Jarry at age 30.
“I always thought Edmonton was special. It was somewhere that I really enjoyed growing up in junior,” he said. “It’s close to the family (his folks live in Vancouver), so it's an easy flight for them. I just really like my time there and my wife really enjoys it too (on the acreage).
“We're quiet people. We like to be away from the action.”
And starting next weekend, when the Oilers return from this five-game journey, the Jarrys will discover just how valuable a little peace and quiet can be, arriving home to take on that notoriously cacophonous job of a National Hockey League goalie in a competitive Canadian market.
Jarry was the key ingredient for Edmonton in a blockbuster deal consummated Friday morning, with goalie Stuart Skinner and defenceman Brett Kulak heading to the Penguins along with a second-round pick (in 2029), for Jarry and minor leaguer Samuel Poulin.
It’s a lopsided deal, and the topic of conversation in Edmonton this weekend, whether or not this trade actually makes the Oilers appreciably better.
Or is this just more of the same in goal, with Jarry — a second echelon NHL starter below the likes of Connor Hellebuyck, Jake Oettinger and Igor Shesterkin — and a bona fide No. 2 in Calvin Pickard manning the Oilers’ pipes.
“We feel like we've made some improvements to our team,” head coach Kris Knoblauch said, “and we are excited about our next chapter.”
What can not be argued, however, is that general manager Stan Bowman shook things up in his dressing room prior to tonight’s Hockey Night in Canada fixture against the Toronto Maple Leafs. In a separate deal, he brought in left-shot defenceman Spencer Stastney, who will take Kulak’s old spot beside righty Ty Emberson on the third pairing tonight.
They say you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette, and Bowman has his chef’s hat on Friday.
“No matter if you're the Stanley Cup champion, a runner-up, or a team that just missed the playoffs, you always need some element of change. Whether that's a drastic change, a minor change, everyone's looking to get better and make small improvements,” Knoblauch said. “With our players, our team, we are always looking at what's best for our run.
“There are friendships, and it's hard to lose a teammate that you've been with for these playoff runs. But I think in the long run, everyone's looking at how we can make our team better.”
The fleet Kulak was a steadying force, despite some early-season struggles this year. As the pressure increased in May and June so did the level of Kulak’s game, a beacon that quietly guided every other player through the playoff fog.
“Kuly was a really good player for us. We’re going to miss him,” Connor McDavid offered Saturday.
And Skinner?
“He should be remembered for leading the way to two Cup Finals, two exciting runs that he backstopped,” McDavid said. “He was a good teammate, always treated people well. That's important.”
Today, however, the Oilers’ crease belongs to that former Memorial Cup-winning goalie, who willingly accepts the mission he’s been assigned: Take the big team, now, to a place it’s been futilely trying to reach.
“It's cool. It’s an opportunity, and I'm fully embracing it,” Jarry said of the task before him. “Being able to be at the pinnacle of sports — that's where you always want to be.
“To have that opportunity — to be on this team, and to be able to do that — it's going to be special.”
